In case, you haven’t heard, SOPA is the acronym for the “Stop Online Piracy Act.” It’s the government’s way of “fixing things.” In this case, it’s “online piracy.” But this bill is so tyrannical, so huge that it stretches it’s black tentacles into the utter regions of the Internet. It’s the lobby baby of the music recording industry and other “entertainment” industries, who want to exert dictator-like powers over OUR online content! According to some of the provisions in this bill, the U.S. government can take down a website if a business even SUSPECTS a website of “infringing” on their “rights.” Wow.

Please sign the online petition to stop SOPA. If this goes through, it will radically increase dictatorial powers of the government and large industries who want to control everything we hear, see, and do. JUST SAY NO to SOPA.

Despair.com says it right! Click the image to see their site of other good posters.

Apparently, their funding has been hit.

The Mountain View, California, Allen Telescope Array has been switched off and placed into hibernation, as of April 22, 2011.

SETI has always been the brunt of the most hilarious and brutal attacks in our household. I always thought it was the stupidest thing (especially because there is no evidence for extraterrestrial life) and was a taxpayer’s money pit.

According to the MercuryNews.com story:

“There is a huge irony,” said SETI Director Jill Tarter, “that a time when we discover so many planets to look at, we don’t have the operating funds to listen.”

SETI senior astronomer Seth Shostak compared the project’s suspension to “the Niña, Pinta and Santa Maria being put into dry dock. “… This is about exploration, and we want to keep the thing operational. It’s no good to have it sit idle.

“We have the radio antennae up, but we can’t run them without operating funds,” he added. “Honestly, if everybody contributed just 3 extra cents on their 1040 tax forms, we could find out if we have cosmic company.”

Oh BOO HOO!! :whyohwhy:

Here, leezard, leezard, leezard...

The problem isn’t that SETI wants 3 extra cents… it’s that EVERYBODY wants 3 extra cents to run their pet projects. If aliens are REALLY out there, let THEIR alien people pay through the snouts for SETI satellites. As for me, I’d rather NOT talk to an alien. Didn’t anybody see the 80′s TV series “V”?! :egads:

But most of all, we should be searching for intelligent life here ON EARTH, because it seems to be getting rarer and rarer…

And he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except the one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Revelation 13:16-17

I once talked to a skeptical relative about the Bible, especially the book of Revelation and the prophecies in it. I said that it was amazing that all these things were happening JUST as the Bible said they would happen.

“People make it happen,” he scoffed.

:blink: Um.. yeah. Your point is?

The creepy thing is that people make it happen without ever realizing they are making it happen! Come on, does Mr. Dastardly rub his hands together in his lab, reading the Bible, and cackling that he is fulfilling the evil stuff that is prophesied to happen? It’s a *little* more complex than that. This is stuff on a global level, over very long periods of time; and it’s specific, talking about marks and numbers (which are modern forms of identification as well as computer calculation). And it’s happening right before our eyes! How can someone just lightly sniff at that?

Anyway, I saw this headline at CNS News today: Senate Panel Previews Electronic Health Technology. This is scary, totally scary! Let me condense it for you:

The government recently passed a National Broadband Plan, to get everyone access to high-speed Internet.

The government passed the Health care Reform Bill (and I use the words “health,” “care,” and “reform” very loosely, mind you) to force every American citizen to be controlled by government health bureaucrats.

The government now wants integrated health technology, via broadband. Here are a few snippets of the story:

• The Senate Committee on Aging last week offered a preview of the government’s future role in health care, showing how Americans will interact with [government-issued] doctors and other [government-issued] health care providers.
• One of the new health technologies on display… was an automatic drug dispenser that can monitor and adjust medication dosages wirelessly
• The device attaches to the patient’s skin and is loaded with drugs that are administered in the exact way that the doctor prescribes – wirelessly
• Health data is automatically uploaded to a patient’s electronic health record, and then reviewed by a [government-issued] doctor from a computer or smart phone, allowing the [government-issued] doctor to monitor a sick patient in almost real time.
• Other areas of interest include medicines that can tell a [government-issued] doctor if they have been taken on time, wireless monitoring of nutritional information, and sensors worn on the body…
• Continuous monitoring of vibrations in the floor can detect falls and classify them according to the best choice of first responders
• Pills will be electronically outfitted with transmitters to communicate with the user’s wristwatch that shows that the pill has been consumed…
• Broadband connectivity of these devices would allow the electronic medical record to be updated with regard to medication compliance and efficacy…

The Bible is looking to be preeeeetttty reliable, if you ask me.

So how do you feel about all this? Do you think I’m going overboard? Are you looking forward to being monitored and connected to a computer to get dosages of medicine as the government sees fit?

Hat tip Cato of Utica.

Read more Word For Wednesdays at Yeah, Right!

You have GOT to be kidding me!!! Dear Government Bureaucrats: “Shoot for the moon” is an IDIOM. A figure of speech! Leave it them to DO something so stupid!

OK OK maybe I’m jumping the gun a little here. But I have visions of Chicken Little right about now. What if NASA shoots their missile and the impact has the effect of something like… like a billiard ball?!?

This is what NASA intends to do, this FRIDAY:

NASA has chosen the final destination for the LCROSS lunar impacting probe: the crater Cabeus A, near the Moon’s south pole.

So why is NASA smacking a probe into the Moon at high speed, and why there?

The idea is that over millions and billions of years, a lot of comets have hit the Moon. The water from these comets hits the surface and sublimates away… but if any settles at the bottoms of deep craters near the Moon’s poles, these permanently shadowed regions can act as a refrigerator, keeping the water from disappearing. It can stay there, locked up as ice, for a long, long time. Some estimates indicate there could be billions of tons of ice near the Moon’s south pole.

Detecting that water is tough. Radar results have been inconclusive, with some people saying there’s lots of water, and others saying there’s none at all. By impacting a probe there, any ice located at the impact site will be shot up above the lunar surface, where sunlight will break it up into H+ and OH- molecules, which can be detected.

:blink:

That’s why they want to hit the moon?? To watch little ice crystals sparkle in the sunshine?! To “prove” that the moon is billions quadrillions years old??

LCROSS is planned to impact the crater at 11:30 GMT on October 9, which is early morning for the U.S. (in fact, there will be two impacts; one from the spacecraft and another by the Centaur booster) The plume from the impact should stretch up many kilometers. It will almost certainly be too thin to be seen by amateur instruments, but the impact itself should make a bright enough flash to be seen if you have a telescope. The crater itself will be in shadow, making the light flash easier to spot. It’ll only last a second or two, so if you want to observe it, be prepared! NASA has a nice webpage with all the info you need to watch this historic event for yourself.

I hope everyone gets a chance to see this!

Uhhhhh I hope everyone gets the chance to SURVIVE this. What happens if they hit the missile a liiiiiiiiiittle too hard, and knock the moon out of orbit??

Scientists and government bureaucrats have a REALLY REALLY lousy history on “doing” and “fixing” things. I am very uncomfortable with them striking the extremely necessary moon– the only one we have, by the way!– to satisfy their curiosity and puff their chests out to the Russians and Chinese.

Give me a break!

P.S. If you liked this post, you might like these, too!

• Crop Circles Mystery: SOLVED!!!
• Oh Those Crazy Alien Drivers!
• Call Me an Unbeliever

Rrrriiiiight.

People, this all about control. I wrote an impassioned, angry post about the proposal here at my other blog.

I have ONE THING to say about this entire FTC crap and all the little minions defending it:

SHOW ME THE MONEY. THE MONEY THAT YOU GUYS ARE GETTING, for sponsoring and supporting this legislation. Please do NOT tell me you are doing it for the protection of the idiot consumer, that’s a lie.

When the FTC and other government lackeys have to play by the same rules as everyone else, then I’ll believe that their laws are just.

When these legislators and government bureaucrats are, by law, required to wear lapel pins or placards with disclaimers saying, “This legislation is sponsored by such-and-such a lobbyist,” I’ll gladly support their law. Until then, this is nothing but the Big Guy oppressing the Little Guy, because this regulation is ridiculous, unenforceable, partial, and tyrannical. (And believe me, I’ll have a few more posts debating the gory details).

We bloggers are being oppressed. The government bureaucrats are the real shills, but they get a FREE ride. This regulation, specifically crafted to target bloggers and excuse everyone else, is nothing but oppression by people in power who want more power. And that’s the truth. :-p

P.S. This is not a sponsored post. :-p

Advertisers in the US are bracing themselves for regulatory changes that they fear will curtail their efforts to tap into the fast-growing online social media phenomenon.

Revised guidelines on endorsements and testimonials by the Federal Trade Commission, now under review and expected to be adopted, would hold companies liable for untruthful statements made by bloggers and users of social networking sites who receive samples of their products.

The guidelines would also hold bloggers liable for the statements they make about products.

If a blogger received a free sample of skin lotion and then incorrectly claimed the product cured eczema, the FTC could sue the company for making false or unsubstantiated statements. The blogger could be sued for making false representations.

…The FTC is revising the guidelines for the first time since 1980, in response to the new forms of advertising spawned by the internet.

“The guides needed to be updated to address not only the changes in technology, but also the consequences of new marketing practices,” said Richard Cleland, assistant director for the FTC’s division of advertising practices. “Word-of-mouth marketing is not exempt from the laws of truthful advertising.”

The main target of the new guidelines appears to be the widespread practice of viral marketing in which companies recruit non- employees to talk up products in exchange for samples or promotions.

Companies regularly offer free samples and concert tickets to bloggers and journalists, in the hope of generating press. However, determining which bloggers are acting as an agent of a company may prove difficult.

While I am 100% against false claims, I don’t see how a blogger or other average citizen can completely investigate a particular claim before forming an opinion. I think that SOME responsibility has to rest on the consumer, ya know– BUYER BEWARE and all that thing. I mean, how stupid does a consumer have to be?! If a blogger claims that some snake oil appetite suppressants will make you lose 100 pounds in an hour…. hello?! Dumb! Do we really need a lawsuit to settle that? And how about all those “make money” schemes, where they guarantee you will make $200,000 the first month? Can they be sued, too? How about the GOVERNMENT– the U.S. government that keeps saying that all this bailout money will cure our recession? That’s false advertising if ever I heard it. Where’s the FTC with that?

Blogs are OPINION forums. An advertiser may ask us to review a product and give our opinion, which we do. I am one of many bloggers who has a disclaimer policy, stating that this blog expresses my OPINION based on what I know to be true. To think that I could be sued is a little much. Doesn’t the FTC have more to do than sit around and harangue us small fish?