NASA Cojones award

It's kind of pathetic if you have your wife plead for your job in public. This goes double, if you're Mike Griffin, NASA chief administrator. It would help, of course, if Mike Griffin wasn't uncooperative with the incoming administration.

It seems to me, though, that there's one thing that Mike Griffin doesn't understand, which is that President-elect Obama is truly serious about supporting NASA's big picture mission, and fully promoting their scientific missions and activities, unlike the Bush administration, which seemed to me to have a truly sectarian agenda. What this means, in practice, is an overall increase in actual activity, possibly at the expense of big ticket/flashy programs, such as Ares I.

What is guaranteed, with the incoming administration, is that intelligent questions will be asked, and that consequently NASA will need a good man at the top. It's unlikely he'll change his attitude, and cultivate a little humility, which is a shame because Griffin is clearly qualified at the technical level. With a truly cooperative disposition, such a person could clearly help define a coherent and meaningful strategy for NASA over the next 8 years, in association with the new administration, which would commit fully to the new direction.

And that's important, because a strong civilian NASA is critical to the economic well being, and technical leadership of this country, and would provide a true and meaningful alternative to defense spending. To me, Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo were inspirational to a generation of engineers, and directly responsible in large part, to the US developing and gaining an overall technological superiority that wasn't ceded to the Japanese until Wall St invaded Silicon Valley in the 1990's. And as much as I support it, the private space industry, imho, is just not in a position to do anything over the next ten years, except put a small number of people/small payload in low orbit. As much as we marvel as what Burt Rutan has been able to do, with his limited resources, it's laughable to suggest that his technology can even begin to compete with what NASA does on a bad day. It's Little League vs Major League.

SciFi Channel redux..

I guess I spoke too soon. SciFi has a *2 day* Twilight Zone marathon going on, right now.
What a fricking waste of airtime.. Just when you thought there was hope...

Christmas sales.. not too bad.

So it looks like not all the financial news, this Xmas, is bad. Apparently, the sales dropoff in stores was only 2%->4%, and Amazon had a monster Xmas, with sales up 17%.

If you're an MBA, spreadsheet driven bean-counting 80's Reaganaut, that might seem like a disaster, but considering the general atmosphere, it's not a bad result for the stores, bearing in mind that to really get a pulse on the economy, we have to see what happens now that the winter sales season has started. Amazon's results suggest that at least part of the drop-off in brick & mortar sales have been made up by online sales, which is a trend that, quite frankly, many people expected to be stronger.

From an economic perspective. it seems to be reasonably good news, as is all activity in the retail sector. It suggests that if the government can stabilize the housing market, by reducing the number of foreclosures and hence allowing the banks to take small but absorbable losses, then we might be in for a much softer landing in the consumer economy than would otherwise occur.

The curse of the Spurs

There's always some relapse, or twist of fate against these guys. You just knew it was going to happen.

It's time to perform an exorcism, sacrifice a chicken or something.. At least try to get the forces of the supernatural world working for the Suns, instead of against them.

SciFI Holiday marathon

Sci FI deserves approbation for putting on Star Trek NG, and Highlander marathons on Xmas & Boxing Day.

This is better, guys. Much better.

Oh Ricky...

Ricky Gervais, live, doing the kind of comedy that only the Brits seem to have a handle on. A sick subject, but it made me laugh out loud.

Ricky Gervais: Hitler Interprets Nietzsche - watch more funny videos

Xmas Repo Man music

Coming from the UK, we got a lot of the NY East Coast Punk scene (Blondie, Ramones, Television, Talking Heads, etc...), but aside from the Dead Kennedys and Wall of Voodoo, not much of the West Coast punk scene, and little from the LA scene. In fact, the only thing we got in abundance from the LA music scene in those days, were the Sunset Strip metal/hair bands like Van Halen, Ratt and Motley Crue.

Anyhoo, this is "Reel Ten", by the Plugz. I love everything they did on the soundtrack to Repo Man, especially the punk version of "Ride of the Valkyries".

Xmas Holdsworth

Kinder, from the Velvet Darkness record.
Most people, including Allan himself, don't realize just how much of a monster player he is on acoustic, where his melodic sense is dramatically different to his electric playing, and has a nice Ralph Towner vibe. He should play more acoustic.

Xmas guitar (part 1)

This has been one of my favorite pieces of music, ever since I was a child, and is performed by probably the greatest living classical guitarist, John Williams.

Merb/rails merger

The Merb & Rails dev groups have decided to merge their two projects into one.

This merger in unprecedented. I can't recall a situation where two such projects, with such orthogonal but functionally overlapping code bases, were joined together. Sure, there have been projects that have been joined, but these were either two forks of a single original project recombining, or two projects that were usually combined in installation.

I think this one announcement illustrates the power of Ruby more than anything else could. This kind of thing wouldn't even be possible, outside of Lisp. Certainly, the Python community is strewn with the corpses of duplicate projects. Even the Numpy/Numerical Python guys had *major* issues.

A tune for the times.

Amazingly underrated band, except by muso types. Great powerful sound live.
Anyhoo, the song is prescient.

The Warren inauguration benediction.

The LGBT community is all in a tizzy about Rick Warren being invited to lead prayers at the Obama inauguration. I understand the outrage, but in the grand scheme of things this will help them.

Why? because, by giving Warren this opportunity, Obama is essentially anointing him as the reader of the Christianist movement at a time, because of the Republican election failures, that group has a massive leadership void. This preemptive move essentially forces the Dobsons and Robertsons out of the picture, and neuters their power.

Why does this matter ? Because despite the fact that Warren is infact almost as homophobic and hateful as the old Christianist guard, he isn't as vitriolic, nor is he much of a power broker or political animal. And that means that when Obama pushes through his proposals for ending DADT and other anti-gay legislation, the opposition will be much weaker than it would be now.

IMHO, the LGBT community needs to stop getting outraged by symbolic acts, and needs to focus on getting it's shit together to move it's own agenda forward. You only have to look at the total amateurish effort to defeat Prop 8, here in California, to see that. At the end of the day, those actual political battles are more important.

Still, that's not to say that the LGBT people shouldn't play hardball against the Mormons, Evangelists and the rest of the religious right. By all means go after the Rollers' tax status, planning, construction and other permits, and make them feel some financial/legal pain.

Credit where credit is due

The SciFi channel has greenlit Caprica, the prequel to Battlestar Galactica. For all my complaining about them, they deserve kudos for this great news. This bodes well for intelligent, non-dumbed down, and well written TV.

Actually, I'm hoping Universal/NBC will rerun Caprica in one of those 10pm slots they're currently struggling to fill, like they're doing with Monk. It seems to me that all their best shows are on their cable channels, where editorial interference from NBC's execs seems to be much less, than on the network.

I'm fully convinced that those execs had much to do with the decline in quality of Heroes, and don't really get the notion that you fixate an audience with ideas rather than stunts and special effects.

Do you know what you are ??

My feelings for humanity encapsulated in 16 seconds:

Nanu, Nanu, my big white hairy ass

ok, SciFi channel... this time you've gone too far: A James Bond Marathon, followed by a Mork & Mindy marathon... this has to stop. now.

Now, don't get me wrong I loved M&M, am a huge Robin Williams fan, and am pretty much a priapic poster child, whenever Pam Dawber appears on screen.. But neither this or the Bond are SciFi.. not even close... This is even worse than the 3 day Twilight Zone/Outer Limits marathons you guys seem so fond of programming.

Listen, it's called the SciFi channel for a reason, and you guys have to try harder to cater to that niche market segment you originally targeted.. Whoever is in charge here is running this network into the ground.

Mitch Mitchell, RIP

Mitch Mitchell passed away this morning.

He was one of the quartet of great British rock drummers from the 60's, the others being Ringo, Keith Moon and Ginger Baker. As a member of the Jimi Hendrix experience, he provided a perfect foil to Hendrix's guitar playing, being as intense, innovative and original in his playing as Jimi was to his. And without him, Hendrix would not have been as successful.

Mitch will be missed.

Honour the covenant

Even though I really didn't fit into English society, there are certain things about the old country that I still cling to, and Remembrance Sunday symbolizes those things.

Let's be clear.. I am not a knee-jerk jingoist, and I was against the Falklands War. But that doesn't mean I don't fully and unreservedly acknowledge the duty and sacrifice of the people who served in that or other conflicts.

The poet Horace wrote: "Dulce et decorum, est pro patria mori". He had a point.

To all our servicemen and servicewomen, thank you.

The coming Civil War

I don't know whether this will be a Cold War, or something more dangerous, but Prop 8 was the first shot of the first battle of this conflict. For the first time I can remember, the Gay community has basically said enough is enough to the Mormons.

They're combating the LDS in a way I only thought Republicans did, which is to go after them in court. This could be very damaging to the LDS, as they could lose their Tax Exempt status, maybe even going back a few years. The consequence, though, will probably be to galvanize the Christianists to prevent a similar attack on them.

Prop 8 makes one thing clear: the Rollers aren't about freedom to practice their beliefs, but are focused on forcing the rest of society to follow their lead. Things are only going to heat up.

What now Sarah ??

One thing that's clear from post-election examination is that the Republican Party just aligned itself Rightwards, and with a Christianist bent. The Republican ticket became a Palin/McCain ticket, the moment she was selected, and McCain wouldn't have come anywhere this close to Barack without her help in rallying the base.

And she did: 57.2 Million people voted for McCain, more than voted for Bush in the 2000 elections (although W got 62 million in the 2004 elections). To me, 57.2 million voters is a solid base, that in the event of voter dropoff, can win her a Presidential election. If the McCain concession speech is anything to go by, all those people are strongly behind her.

Some commentators have been making the Nixon/Palin comparison, correctly noting that Nixon was considered to be somewhat of a joke in 1962. Her best bet, imho is to position herself for a run in 2016, and to take the intervening time to take control of the Republican Party. However, her success depends on a few things:

1. Making sure that Alaska becomes a well run state, and distance herself from the incompetence and fiscal imprudence of the Bush administration.
2. Make sure her state administration becomes a paragon of virtue, and clean up ethically. Caesar's wife, & all that.
   
3. Develop a coherent policy portfolio, including Energy, Immigration and the Economy. If I were her I'd read up on the Austrian school (like Ron Paul), and use that as the basis of an economic policy.
4. Stay in the public eye, at least to the base. That means going on Rush and the late night shows, and trying to cultivate an image of intelligence.
5. Build a team to start her 2016 campaign now, and make sure those people are loyal to her, and not to others. McCain's big mistake, in this campaign, was hiring Rove's protege Schmitt, and in losing control of his own campaign. If Obama has demonstrated anything in this campaign it's the need for the candidate to be clearly in charge, and to drive the strategy and major tactical decisions of the campaign. Sarah Palin will need to be 1/3 Mother Theresa, 1/3 Feynmann and 1/3 Napoleon.
   

Even in the age of Youtube, rehabilitation is possible: look at Hilary Clinton's revitalization from the election. In any case, Sarah Palin's story is not over, by any stretch of the imagination. And that should be a scary prospect to anyone who is not a Roller.

Sun Tzu...

Amare has a new nickname now.. It looks like the kid is finally growing up, under the tutelage of Shaq Fu himself.

For that reason alone, the trade for Shaq seems to be working out. Clearly, as much as I think of Nash, while he can lead a team into battle, he isn't the kind of leader that can get someone to completely change his attitude away from the court. And because of the racial nature of the NBA, and the players therein, it's helping that the white boy isn't getting the lions' share of the glory, however much he may have deserved it.

It's early, but with the full preseason together, and the spotlight shining away from them, for once, this years Suns have the opportunity to create some real chemistry. This could be a magical year.

Oh Emanuel!

Barack Obama's choice of Rahm Emanuel, as his Chief of Staff, is a very important development, and an early warning to the Republicans, and others, that their usual shenanigans will not be tolerated.

There's an air of Don Vito Corleone about Obama, that I'm starting to like: make the reasonable, mutually beneficial offer up front, and send Luca Brazzi/Rahm Emanuel around when the compromise is rejected out of hand. This new administration is starting to shape up as a group that intends to get a lot of things done, through reason and mutual understanding, where possible, and by coersion where necessary.

Of course, only someone like Barack could get away with such an approach, because he is not a man whose ego is driven either by ideology, the need to humiliate his enemies, or the need to be placated by Ozymandian constructions. This is an administration that is going to move forward relentlessly in increments, making enough small changes, in the right order, so that at the end, a massive change will have occurred. For them, the destination is far more important than the journey.

Shaq and Awe 2.0

This evening, the Suns put a smackdown on the Nets, 114 to 86. What was encouraging was the fact they shot 77% in the 1st half, including 93% in the 2nd quarter (13 of 14). Turnovers, though, are still a problem.

Here's the thing.. the Suns are a rhythm team, and Steve Nash is a rhythm player, depending on timing and everybody moving to the right place on the floor, at the right time, in order to make some plays almost automatic. During the Nash era, it has usually taken the Suns at least 10 games to get into full sync. That the Suns were able to put up this kind of performance, this early in the season, should have the rest of the league watching nervously.

I don't think we've seen the best of the Suns offense, yet this year. In my mind, they're just warming up. This could be really good.

Holy crap!!!

The news networks just called the election for Barack Obama.

For now, this represents the victory of hope over cynicism. Of competence and intelligence, over idiocy and dogma. I'm a little teary eyed about this. The world has just become a better place.

Dear President-Elect Obama. Our hopes and dreams are in now in your hands. Please don't fuck it up.

Big trade between Denver & Detroit

Iverson to Detroit for Billups & McDyess. I don't get it, except for the salary cap thing.

Don't get me wrong.. I'm an Iverson fan, ever since Philly played LA in the finals... not because I think he's a particularly good player, but because he has more heart & moxie than any player in the NBA not named Steve Nash. Still, this means that one team has decided to shut down for the season after two games, because Detroit just traded 2/3 of their mojo.

Oh, before I forget... Rasheed & Iverson on the same team ?? Holy crap!! talk about gangsta!

We live in strange times.

The NBA is back, baby..

Cool. it's time to get serious.
A few points and predictions:

• Steve Nash is *still* the best PG in the league. While Chris Paul is destined to be the next great PG, he isn't there yet. Nash is still a better passer, shooter, court seer, decision maker, had to deal with 2 head cases in Amare & Marion, *and* had to reformulate his offense with the introduction of Shaq. Chris Paul will have to deal with the curse of Shinn this year, as well as the extra physical toll due to the Olympics.
  
• The Suns will not suck as much as everyone thinks. They have a front line that can beat the Lakers and the Hornets, if Shaq has been doing the work to become more mobile. Their new found depth will help.
  
• Kobe will be injured for extended periods this season. For that reason, the Suns will win the Pacific.
• Either LeBron or Chris Paul will win the MVP, this year. maybe Amare, if he has the statistically monster season we expect.
  
• Western conference in this order:

1. Hornets
2. Jazz
3. Suns
4. Rockets
5. Lakers
6. Spurs
7. Mavs
8. Blazers
   

• The winner of this years title will be a team that didn't send someone to the Olympics.
  
• The Jazz are this years championship dark horse.
• Boston will get back to the finals. One of Jazz, Suns, Rockets in the West.
  
• The Knicks will make the playoffs. As will Portland.
  

Friday morning jazz-grunge

Foo Fighters & Chick Corea at the Grammys, with a theme for our times:

If you reward behavior, you'll get the behavior you reward.

Today I booked a trip to Austin, for SC-08. For some reason, Travelocity thinks I'm a cripple, and chose an accessible room for me, which I missed in my struggle to complete the transaction.

Now, not being a complete asshole, and knowing that a lot of disabled people turn up to the SC show, I figured I'd do the right thing & give up the accessible room for a standard room, since they cost *exactly* the same.

I phoned Travelocity, and after waiting for 20 mins for a service rep, they wanted $260 to make this trivial change. Phoned the hotel, and they wouldn't make the change, since I booked it through Travelocity.

Now, I tried to be a nice guy, I really did, but all I got was a load of jip.

To be honest, I'm a little pissed about it, because there shouldn't be any barriers to doing this kind of thing, especially when there's no cost. But these companies all hide behind their policies, which dehumanize the people working for them. We've become an amoral, callous people.

The cold war with Cuba will end soon.. but...

Because of this.

20 Billion barrels is a lot of oil, and I wouldn't be surprised to see Mexico, Venezuela and Cuba form a little bloc, just like the Arab nations. I'm guessing their instincts would not drive them to be overtly friendly to the US, especially if we continue our neo-imperial foreign policy.

It's going to be hard for President Obama to solve this, without pissing off the wingnuts.

I think we're already in a situation where a whole bunch of armed people think that any Democratic administration is inherently illegitimate, and that if Barack Obama becomes President, the only way that could happen is if the election was stolen. If President Obama normalizes relations with Cuba, and ends the fake cold war, that could trigger a whole bunch of trouble.

The question I have in my mind, is whether we will have a second civil war in this country, with the Rollers and Christian Paranoids vs. everyone else. From a population point of view, it's a 40:60 split between the Christianists and the rest of us, and they're armed. Heavily armed.

This is the true danger of a Blackwater or similar company: a private army outside the control of any legal authority, and subject only to the whims of its owner, who happens, in the case of Blackwater, to be a true, balls to the wall, Christian Dominionist.

Joe the Plumber...

sounds like the title of a Primus song.

Here's a real Primus song:

Evidence that if there is a God....

he/she/it has a sense of humor. Congrats to Krugman. I'm sure the money will come in handy in these troubled times.

Still, I have to say, he didn't strike me as the kind of person who was Nobel worthy. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan, but his NY Times columns really don't betray the kind of searing intellect or organizational capability I'd normally associate with Nobel laureates or Fields Medal winners, Kary Mullis notwithstanding. And I've met a few of both, including the bongo player, over the years. Guess I was wrong.

From a political point of view, though, this is a big plus for the Democrats. Krugman was Hillary's economic adviser, and the prize is going to be seen as a significant kind of approbation.

And I'd bet dollars to pesos that Bill O'Reilly is just about ready to blow a gasket. *That* is going to be fun to watch.

From the dept of the bleeding obvious...

IBM's tech marketing guys just put up a page on how to optimize your app using Lapack. Oh really??.. Can we have a page about kittens too ?

I'm not sure they realize how lame this is, nor do they understand they it betrays a level of ignorance about HPC that is quite astounding. LAPACK is a sort of HPC Rorshach test.. it's main use is for the HPL benchmark, and although some solvers do use those routines, most don't.

Whenever I deal with a company in the HPC space, and they get all exited about LAPACK and other libraries, I start the countdown until they do out of business. Now, there's no danger of IBM getting out of the HPC space, since because of BlueGene and P series, they're one of the few companies making money in this space. But it's depressing to see such an unsophisticated and prosaic piece from them.

Barack Obama: Superhero

IDW publishing has just put out their Presidential Material series, a couple of comic books outlining the biographies of Barack Obama and John McCain. From this cover, Barack looks like a man on a mission:

New Nobel prizes for Medicine

Montagnier & Barre-Sinoussi for the discovery of the AIDS virus, and Hausen for discovering the link between HPV and cervical cancer. Its good to see truly important work being acknowledged.

Still crazy after all these years...

So, John McCain has a wild and crazy brother? Scary thought. Although, reading the new article in Rolling Stone about St John, one would still have to give the edge to him.

This reminds me of the Vick brothers... just when you thought Marcus Vick was a total loon, along comes Michael to put things into true perspective.

She sells Sanctuary.

Just watched the new SciFi channel show, Sanctuary. The premise is interesting, with a mix of Victorian Gothic and modern themes.

The first show was a little hokey, and the pacing was a little uneven, as all first shows are. But the villain was pretty good, although he was dispatched fairly quickly and without too much fuss, despite being quite dark and formidable. It's too much to expect this show to be as intelligent as Galactica, but there are signs the producers could make this show fairly sophisticated, once it gets into it's stride, without alienating the audience.

In any case, Amanda Tapping is smoking hot as a long haired brunette. That will be enough to keep my attention, for now.

Some songs should not be used for ads.

I just saw an ad for Lincoln automobiles, which had a cover of Space Oddity emasculated by some random girl singer, the way Target has done with the Beatles' Hello Goodbye. This is different because Bowie still owns the songwriting for his songs, unlike the Beatles' publishing, which are owned by Sony.

So, while I respect the artists' right to do anything they want with their songs, and Bowie is certainly commercially aware, I have to say that it cheapens them to be used in this way.

Anyway, this is the original video & recording of Space Oddity, pre-Angie. And it doesn't have Rick Wakeman's classic mellotron.

The man from Berkshire Hathaway.. he say yes.

When Warren Buffett says it's time for government intervention, we really ough't to pay attention.

I don't usually pay much attention to what Wall St asks for, since I think they're a bunch of overpaid prissy primadonnas. But Berkshire Hathaway is the epitome of a conservative, risk averse company, and Buffett is well known for being prudent and farsighted, and not being greedy.

I think he's really worried about what could happen, and that's enough for me.

Thursday Night Doors

My 2nd favorite Doors song, after Riders.

Happy International Talk like a Pirate day

Yarrgh

No tech for you..

I'm sick & tired of the Rollers.

Listen, if you don't believe in Science or Reason, and think that the truth is contained in a black book about the continuing adventures of an insecure invisible Sky Wizard, his kid, and their sidekicks, then you're not allowed to use the stuff we discovered and invented. That's right.. no more tv or radio, no more cell-phones, computers or internet, no more medicine, automobiles, and definitely no more guns for you.

You want a weapon? Jawbone of an ass.
You want transport? Horse & buggy works just fine for the Amish.

Don't like it. Then apologize.

A silver lining to the financial crisis

Now, I understand that structurally what the government did was essentially extend a bridge loan to AIG, but even so there is a big upside to this thing: if Barack Obama becomes President, he will have an enormous opportunity and now the means to implement universal health insurance, given that the government now controls the worlds' largest insurance company. And probably do it far more cheaply than before this event.

Because of its size, AIG will be able to directly set pricing for the entire industry. We should have a health care system that is comparable is scope to what the French have, and be able to take advantage of cost savings due to scale, and the shift away from using expensive emergency medical services to treat the uninsured to encompassing those people within the medical systems' normal framework. If we supplement that with laws to reduce the legal shenanigans of the medical insurance industry and truly reduce the cost of prescription medicine, it could be a good system.

IMHO, every company should support Universal Health Insurance as it will reduce the burden on individual companies, and provide all workers with the health care they need.

From the dept of I told you so..

As I've mentioned a number of times here, for the Rollers, Palins' gig as VP is all about the apocalypse, and nothing else matters. Here's a post, via Sullivan & Salon that corroborates my earlier contention.

Let's be clear, Sarah Palin is the kind of politician that makes you glad Dick Cheney is the VP.

Vas deference

While I'm not surprised at Big Medias' complicity with the McCain campaign, it is amazing to see that servitude in action, and the lengths to which the Media is going. As Frank Zappa once said: "There's a big difference between kneeling down and bending over".

It is somewhat breathtaking to see the McCain campaign lie, deceive and bully the press and not get even a wrist slap from them. Even I'm impressed. However, the self-yielding of the press to the Republicans though, must come with a price: if the Republicans get re-elected into the White House, given the mess the country is in, the press must be held responsible for that. After all, only a sociopath would allow a pit bull unleashed on the street, after it had already bitten some people.

I'd bet, though, that if the Democrats came to power, and seeing how they treated Clinton, the press corps would find their missing cojones in a hurry.

From the dept of irony...

Apparently, the dude got this piece of junk mail in the post yesterday. I guess they do have the protection they need.

Late night Frisell

One of the most tasteful guitarists around, Bill Frisell uniquely bridges the gap between jazz and country, to produce a truly American sound, in the same spirit as Copland. In addition, he collaborates with many people, and the results are almost always intriguing.

Anyway, this is his take on a classic American song:

The laws of supercomputing

Its about time I wrote some of these down:

1. It's all about the memory.
2. Latency is next to Godliness
   
3. Any asshole can build a fast floating point unit.
   
4. Cache is King.
   
5. Storage is memory
6. Parallel programming isn't complicated, but it is hard.
7. Data drives computation.
8. You can hide latency, but you can't make it run.
9. Go for capability or capacity, but not both.
10. One process, then two, then many.
11. Explicit parallelism beats implicit parallelism.
12. Don't call, compile.
13. No non-trivial application will run faster than the Linpack benchmark.
14. Innovation in HPC in the last 10 years has consisted almost solely of the bending of sheet metal.
15. 95% of all supercomputing is capacity oriented.
16. All meaningful HPC programming is done in Fortran or C
    

Carly, Carly, Carly.

So, Carly Fiorina doesn't think Sarah Palin is qualified to run a big company like HP:



Talk about pot calling the kettle black. Has everyone forgotten Carlys' less than dignified forced exit from HP ?? There is no person in the valley who has more experience being under-qualified to run a large tech company than Carly herself.

It's directly because of people like Carly Fiorina, and their greedy grasping for self-aggrandizement and self-enrichment that we find ourselves in the economic mess we're in. When she was kicked out of HP, she had a $42M golden parachute. That says it all.

From the dept of oxymorons: Low cost Cray

Cray has finally announced a low-cost HPC system.

This might have been a good idea for them, 6 years ago, when I first proposed it as a member of Cray's ill-fated cluster group. However, this is nothing more than a minor play, rebadging OEM blade boxes with Cray livery, and represents an expensive implementation of something that is already available for far below what Cray is charging. It's an exercise in branding, in an industry where branding takes second place to word of mouth and reputation, and from the press release, Cray isn't adding any significant value, using Infiniband instead of their own interconnect, and using off the shelf software. Ciara and Tyan make boxes just like this, only much cheaper.

The problem for Cray is that most of their stellar talent, with the exception of Steve Scott, have left for greener pastures. What's left is basically a bunch of mostly ex-IBMers running the joint, people who really don't understand this business from a user point of view. OTOH, this is a tacit acknowledgment that the future of HPC is not in Big Iron (although that will always be there), but in smaller, more easily deployable chunks, and that's a good thing for Cray, even if it took them 6 years to get there.

If Cray can innovate in the software side, add their own personality to the box, and use it as a stepping stone to their larger systems, they might have a shot. I wouldn't hold my breath, though.

2/3 HBS = BS

When I first came to the US in 1991, the valley was still a place where people made things. Cool things, like SGI workstations and satellites, and the corporate ethos was dominated by engineers. The competition was simple: the companies that built the best products, won. And it was a straightforward activity, because the guys who designed and built the products also used them.

In that rarefied time, those innovative tech companies did well: well qualified engineers did the work, and were paid well. Management saw its role as that of being an enabler or facilitator, in a collective context. The only people who did spectacularly better, financially, were the founders of these companies, and that's as it should be given they were the ones with the cojones to walk the walk.

But that all changed. Silicon Valley became infused with Business School graduates and people with marketing degrees, and the focus changed from the team/collective journey to the deification of individual accomplishment, reinforced by a trend to spreadsheet driven management. Individuals in a company were being judged, and compensated, by the completion of their individual goals and how much they had individually contributed. If you saved the company $500K this quarter, that was good for you, no matter what the consequence of that 1 year down the line. From a corporate culture, point of view, we had given ourselves an acute case of ADD.

In addition, the focus at the top end of the company centered around two concepts: shareholder value and corporate leadership/vision. Companies were now being run to maximize shareholder return, rather than to increase market share and customer satisfaction. In fact, as the MBAs figured out they could outsource many essential functions, and hide the true cost in the balance sheet while taking credit for payroll and other savings, customers became less and less satisfied. Meanwhile, those savings didn't go to the customer, but ended up in the pockets of executive management. And as executive leadership metamorphosed into a cult of personality, more and more of a company's' revenue and value was diverted to satisfy those compensation needs.

What is happening in Wall St, is just the chickens coming home to roost. It is the direct consequence of letting people with paper qualifications, but no real world experience, make corporate decisions that primarily benefit themselves, in the short term. Letting newly minted MBAs run around proclaiming that the world had moved on, and the rest of us didn't get it.

And this isn't going to be easy to fix. The country owes more money than it can pay back, and we still have a corporate class that insists on pursuing the trust-fund economics that this administration and those since Reagan have foisted upon us. But there is a solution, and it does have a simple overall structure:

1. End the war in Iraq and Afghanistan.
   
2. Cut all corporate subsidies to large corporations including Oil & Gas, and large Agriculture.
3. Eliminate tax loopholes and other evasion/avoidance schemes.
4. Force entities who issue credit to be able to back those loans.
   
5. Treat dividends as income.
6. Reduce outsourcing: penalize companies that do outsource abroad and VCs that encourage it.
7. Vigorously prosecute corporate malfeasance.
   
8. Fix and regulate stock option and other compensation for management and executives.
9. Redact laws that force companies to put shareholder concerns above others: customers first, employees next, and *then* shareholders.
   
10. Raise taxes if necessary, but do it at the high end first.
11. Invest in new energy: power and transport
    
12. Invest in infrastructure: transport and energy distribution and storage.
    
13. Reduce dependence on foreign energy: this one act will alter our balance of payments in a favorable way.
    
14. Universal health insurance: remove this burden from companies.
    
15. Universal access to all levels of education.

The key here is to try and revitalize spending at the consumer & corporate level, by freeing more money at the lower end of the income scale, and stimulate the economy by spending money at home, specifically with infrastructure projects such as construction. Bubble up economics, if you like.

However, part of the problem is that we have become decadent and corrupt, and have lost the creative spirit and can-do attitude of the 50s. Our new President, needs to show us the way back to a more honest way of life.

Rick Wright, RIP

Rick Wright, the keyboard player with Pink Floyd just died.

To me, he was the George Harrison of the Floyd, and vastly underrated, while at the same time hugely influential. People raved about Waters' songwriting, and Dave Gilmours' guitar playing, but Rick Wrights' atmospheric space-rock keyboards where the heart and soul of that band, especially on "Dark Side of the Moon" and "Wish You Were Here". When he did contribute, compositionally, the results were often classic songs.

I was never a huge Floyd fan, certain songs notwithstanding, but I loved his tasteful and understated playing and textures, and the fact that he rejected the muscular pyrotechnics of a Jobson, Wakeman or Emerson, even though he was abundantly capable of doing that. His sound was unique, and continues, to this day, to be copied and borrowed, and the Floyd would not have been anywhere close to the band it became without him.

This song was one of his:

A few 9/11 anniversary thoughts.

I grew up in England, near London, during the height of the IRA's and UDF's reign of terror on the UK. In my life, there are 5 or 6 places I have frequented or visited that were bombed by the IRA, and where people died, including some people I knew. But life carried on.

And when 7/7 happened in London, I couldn't have been prouder of my fellow countrymen, for telling the terrorists, in no uncertain terms, that they wouldn't be cowed or browbeaten into submission, by just going down to the pub and drinking a defiant pint or two. After all, if Hitler and the IRA couldn't intimidate Londoners, then a bunch of low-rent Muslim terrorists really don't stand much of a chance.

However, one thing is certain: in the UK, no politician, not Thatcher, Blair or even Boris Johnson would ever dare contemplate the use of any such tragedy for direct political advantage. Ever.

So,when I say I'm disgusted with McCain & Palin for doing just that, please understand where I'm coming from. For me terrorism is not an abstract notion, but a real and present danger, and one which tells us about ourselves by the way we respond. Nietzsche once wrote: "Those who hunt monsters, must be careful not to become monsters", and I think that's a prime and moral imperative in our fight against terrorism. We cannot let ourselves become what we despise, whatever the temptation or provocation.

For McCain to be such a fearmonger, is a reprehensible and vile act by a venal man. But it won't work. Not on me, nor on the average American or Brit.

Senator McCain and Governor Palin, let me say this on the 7th anniversary of the 9/11 tragedy: I am not frightened by our enemies, nor will I condone the efforts by you and your cronies to scare us into submission. If you want to be scared, by something you don't understand, instead of confronting it, that's fine by me, but I, for one, will not be a hostage to your fears. Not now, not ever.

And if Barack Obama wins this election, neither will the rest of us.

When the game is rigged.

As a foreigner, I am amazed at the relationship between media and the political parties in the US, especially at how blatantly the major TV and cable channels shill for the Republicans.

MSNBC have dropped Matthews and Olbermann as anchors for their election coverage, apparently on the grounds of impartiality. That might be true, insofar as Matthews and Olbermann have called the Republicans on their bullshit, and not given them a free pass. The real problem, imho, is the link with NBC, and the fact that the people at the Peacock network think of themselves as serious journalists and cable TV as some kind of broadcasting ghetto.

Of course, if this were the UK, we wouldn't have this problem. People like Jeremy Paxman make Olbermann look like a nice, shy boy from New York.

Ratings....

According to Neilson, John McCain's speech got 500,000 more viewers than Barack Obama. Combine that with Sarah Palin's ratings, and it doesn't take a blind man to see that the Republicans have a really good chance to win the election.

The Democrats have work to do. This is not going to be a cakewalk for them.

A disturbance in the farce...

John McCain's speech, last night, had the tired air of a condemned man, almost apologetic in it's tone. Contrast that with Sarah Palin's, which was defiant and full of condescension. The torch was clearly passed, and say what you will, this is now a Palin/McCain ticket.

Coincidentally, Ron Paul was on Colbert, last night, and talked about how the Republicans has basically gagged him and his supporters during the convention.

Which leads me to my point.. Regardless of whether the Republicans win or lose, this year, the Christianists are now the dominant force within the party. And while in the past, the Patrician wing of the Republican party has been willing to join forces with the Rollers, in order to get what they want, there's a clear fracture within the party. If they do lose, there's going to be a strong realignment within the party, and the Ron Paul libertarian wing of the party might be the blade that cleaves the stone, clearly dividing the Republicans into fiscal conservatives and social conservatives.

Now, imho it's not that clear cut, since Ron Paul, while havng a cohesive philosophy, doesn't have a cohesive or realistic plan for governing. In particular, his audience includes many of the same Dominionist/Christanist elements that dominate the Republican party right now, drawn by his call for States Rights, and other dogwhistle issues.

Thursday night Prog

Just a reminder of how great a guitarist Steve Hackett is, even when he's not soloing but "just" providing counterpoint and textures. Along with Edge, he is probably the guitarist that best provides just the right colour, tone and sound at the right time.

He could be subtle and dominant at the same time. In 30 years, Daryl Stuermer, as great as he is, could never quite capture what made Hackett tick. Of living guitarists, only Holdsworth and Jeff Beck are greater, although Fripp is an equal.

Anyhoo, this one is dedicated to John McCain, and the song title says it all.

Fundamentalist Terminators

Sullivan has a good posting on his blog about the shift in the Republican Party towards a Theocratic state. While I think he understands the danger, I don't think he quite realizes how far down the path the country has already gone.

Let me quote from The Terminator, so you get what I'm saying:
"Listen. And understand. That terminator is out there. It can't be bargained with. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are dead."

These people are relentless, and will not stop until they've forced the rest of us to live under the yoke of their theology. Dismantling Rove vs. Wade will only be the start.. they'll force creationism and who knows what other nonsense down our throats.

Let me put it this way, in deference to her namesake Pythonista: if she's elected, you can expect the Spanish Inquisition. Only this time around, there won't be any comfy chairs.

Darth Palin

I touched on this a couple of posts ago.

The question on everybody's lips wrt Mrs Palin is how good a president will she make if McCain fails to complete his first term. The more salient question that should be on everyone's mind is what kind of a Vice President will she make. The answer is Dick Cheney, with a vindictive streak and a Messiah complex.

Why? Well I've been trying to figure out why someone like Sarah Palin would accept the nomination, when she knows full well what her baggage looks like, and what national exposure would do to bring all that to light. After all, she's a Republican, and all she has to ask herself is what would she do if she were the press or the Democrats. From a normal perspective, there would be just too much downside if she didn't take time to prepare.

However, it's my opinion that she, and the rest of the Christian Right supporting her, feels that she's been selected, plucked out of thin air, to be an "Instrument of God" in order to perform some holy task.. Whether that's true or not, or what that holy task is (my guess is that it involves continuing to blow the shit out of a bunch of short brown people), you'd have to ask the Big Guy (who I technically don't believe in). But it is a mindset that permeates the whole right-wing end-times Christianist movement, that they are chosen, and the rest of us are damned. Remember, these are people who think that the Left Behind books are akin to a fifth gospel.

The danger comes from the fact that unlike Helen Chenowith, Mrs Palin doesn't come across as a fundamentalist nutcase when you see her on TV, but as a regular all-American gal, with 5.5 kids and a manly husband, a dog and a killer recipe for Moose stew. But make no mistake, she's someone who has already demonstrated an eager willingness to use the privileges of office to settle scores and reward supporters, and to promote her Christianist mindset, without a care as to who gets damaged in the process. She has also shown a talent for profligate spending, and the political nous to get substantial earmarks allocated to her town and state. There won't be any problem for her trying to fit in Washington, especially with the Republicans circling the wagons and protecting one of their own.

I'll say this, if John McCain gets elected, things could get bad. Sarah Palin, is Dobson's Trojan Horse, let in through the gates of Troy by McCain's Faustian deal with the Religious Right. And once you make a deal with the Devil, there's no turning back.

Say what you will about George W, but he only appropriated the language of that movement, and while he was actively sympathetic to their cause, he never let them actually drive the car. If I gave a rats ass for myself and the rest of the Human Race, this prospect would scare me, but I'm just here to watch, and roast my marshmellows in the fires. We'll get who we collectively deserve.

btw, if McCain does somehow get himself elected President, I'd bet dollars to doughnuts he won't last the first term. There's just too much temptation for the Rollers to pass up.

There's never a vet when you need one.

I've been thinking a little more about the Palin pick, and how the McCain organization has seemingly failed to properly vet the Republican nominee for VP. It seems to me that if Dobson, Limbaugh and co. were going to impose a running mate on McCain, then they themselves should at least have properly pre-vetted that person.

I will be surprised, though, if Sarah Palin gets dropped: unlike George W Bush, who simply co-opted their line, she's the real deal, if a little low-calorie, so to speak. Belonging to the Alaskan Independence Party in the 90's, and the association with her pastors, far from being disqualifying, actually reinforce her bona fides with the Christianist/Dominionist wing of the Republican Party

This is post-invasion Iraq all over again, in the sense that these people care only about a very small set of criteria (the usual positions on abortion, etc..), and don't even care that the people they're placing in positions of responsibility should at least be moderately qualified for the job, if not actually good at their jobs. The problem with that attitude is that these people only know 2 ways to solve a problem: a prayer and a hammer (the more heavy handed, the better). We're seeing that in St Paul, this week, with the way the authorities are dealing with the protesters. It doesn't bode well.

I have have just one request. Guys, if you're going to be fascist tyrants, could you at least be competent fascist tyrants, and put a little elan into the job? What you're doing right now, well it's just amateurish and embarrassing, and not worthy of a 3rd world banana republic. Truly.

Cheneys young apprentice..

here's the thing: if John McCain does become President, he's likely to be just as lightweight in the job as our current president.

As the saying goes, nature abhors a vacuum, and what that means is that there will be a huge opportunity for Sarah Palin to fill the power void, and be as powerful a VP as Dick Cheney, if not more so. At the very least, you will see a continuation of the energy policies that the current VP has been pursuing, as he takes her under his wing to teach her all he can. Also, she'd be much more proactive in ensuring important positions get filled by Christianists.

The diss on Palin is that she'd have to build an entire team, but I don't think that's true. For one, she can inherit Cheneys, or quickly assemble a team from Dobsons organization. These people will be ready to go on day one. All she has to do is embrace the Dark Side, and she could do that in a heartbeat.

Scandals on the McCain side don't matter

Some time ago I thought McCains campaigns was dead, not because he was in involved in a scandal, but because he was involved in a scandal involving a woman on the side, Vicki Iseman. There's nothing more that the media likes, imho, than a fresh & juicy sex scandal. Or so I thought. But, McCain is still here, in part because the media gave him a total free pass on that scandal.

Similarly, the press is probably going to drop Palins Troopergate problem like 3rd period French once the convention gets going, and Gustav blows its way through Louisiana & Mississippi.

Unless, of course, they've come to the conclusion, as I have, that McCain is a complete and total nutcase. I wouldn't hold by breath for that particular epiphany to happen, btw.

I can tell you this, though: given all that has happened with the current administration, Troopergate and Babygate are nothing. The religious base won't care one iota and will forgive almost any sin of hers, because all they really care about is that she's one of them, and that is an extremely powerful meme, especially since many of them still think Barack is a Muslim. You shouldn't be fooled, either, by the fact that she's only the VP. With McCain, given his health and his dubious past, she's closer to the main chair than any recent VP, Cheney notwithstanding, and the base are a patient bunch.

What they see in Sarah Palin is the whole brass ring: the chance to turn this country into a provincialist, 19th century minded, fundamentalist theocracy, and that prospect more than anything else is what has fired them up. I know this because McCain just raised $7 million in 24 hrs, and the Democrats underestimate this at their peril.

If the rollers can get themselves a 50% or 60% turnout in the base, that in combination with all the dirty tricks the Republicans are likely to pull, could carry them over. And rest assured, the Republicans won't go down without a fight.

Half baked Alaska

All the talk has been about John McCains judgment in selecting Sarah Palin, and I myself have used a few strong words in that regard.

However, no-one has yet talked about Sarah Palin's faulty judgment in accepting the nomination for VP. Clearly, she is unqualified, right now, to serve either in that capacity, or as the President. In my view, she should know better and declined the offer, particularly in light of her on-going troubles in her state. That she didn't tells you a couple of things: either Sarah Palin is too vain, naive or stupid to realize her predicament; or she thinks John McCains campaign is stone cold dead, right now, and is using the opportunity to earn some chits with the rest of the Republican Party that she can redeem in the future, say 2016.

The difficulty for her is that she's a fringe player, both geographically and politically, and not close to the Republicans central power base. It's a play, if she's not careful, that could split the Republican Party for years to come, between the social/religious conservatives, and the fiscal/constitutional conservatives.

How far we've come in HPC.

GPUs represent a revolution in the way HPC will get done in the future, but something obvious but important needs to be said.

For $550, I can now buy a single graphics card that can do 2.4 TFlops single precision, and almost 1/2 TFlop in double precision. That's more floating point performance on a single card than existed in total on the entire planet in 1984, in either single or double precision, and about 100x over the performance of a desktop or laptop PC. Similar scaling is happening in other places (you can now buy a single TByte disk for $300). Moores Law is a wonderful thing.

But this has an important consequence: the Pandora's box of technology has not just been opened, but finally and irreversably shredded apart. Any attempt to prevent enemy or terrorist nations or mad supervillains from using computer technology is pointless. Any laptop, even from Frys, has more than enough power and memory to do the job, whatever job. Malevolence is not tempered or regulated by elegance or efficiency.

None of you know who this man was

Henri Cartan has just passed away at the age of 104.

He was a co-founder of the Bourbaki group, who were the philosophical leaders of the French school of 20th century mathematics, and who had a profound influence worldwide. His father, Elie Cartan, was a giant in the field, working on Lie groups and Differential Geometry.

Johnny Too Bad

John Martyn is a huge influence on my playing, doing the Echoplex call and reply interplay a good decade before Edge. This is kind of Prog-Reggae and a little strange.

Given how much I've been ranting at the old geezer, and the title of this song, I had to share.

In the end we get the president we deserve.

Or at least, the president we collectively think we deserve.

I've had a little more time to ponder the Palin selection, and while I understand the tactical and strategic thinking behind it, I can't help but think that John McCain must be clinically insane. Not Ron Paul, eccentric uncle crazy, but full-blown Sterling Heyden in Strangelove, Martin Sheen in Dead Zone, Heath Ledger as the Joker, batshit deranged psychosis.

After Friday, the stark contrast between him and Barack has never been clearer. The only question in my mind, now, is whether the conservative media will come to their collective senses, and start to understand how dangerous this guy is, stop covering for him, and stop acting as the Republican Party's ventriloquist's dummy.

Look, the rollers will vote for McCain in any event, especially given his VP pick, and they don't care about anything except making the Rapture happen as soon as possible. But the rest of us (actually, the rest of you since I can't vote yet) have a decision to make.

From my point of view, it's an easy choice.

Jumping sharks and the Palin pick

McCain has just shifted the goalposts in the national debate from experience to judgment, and in the process it looks like he scored a huge own goal.

Now, I don't know anything about Sarah Palin (and that's problem #1), she could be the sweetest, most capable and most decent person on the planet, and if George W Bush is qualified to be President, then Sarah Palin is certainly qualified to be Vice President (actually she might be too nice for the job).

However, she's involved in an active and ongoing scandal, and has *strong* associations with Ted Stevens.

For McCain to choose her, after Obama selected Biden, must call his judgment into serious question, and only reflects the bind he's in in trying to maintain his base while wooing disaffected Hillary supporters. It also shows that McCain is not a serious man, when it comes to the presidency, and that he's trying to win this election through the political equivalent of branding, rather than through a substantive campaign of issues.

The prospect of McCain as president now has my attention. Seriously. The guy is a lunatic, and I can't wait to see what happens.

All the nightmares came today, and it looks as though they're here to stay.

Sure, he was probably reading way too much Edward Bulwer-Lytton, but the whole spaceman, human evolution shtick made Bowie an interesting and original artist up to & including the Ziggy Stardust years

Late night chick asskickery

Along with post-Genesis Peter Gabriel and David Bowie, she was part of the British Prog-Pop movement, and became a highly experimental musician in a pop context, doing pioneering work with the Fairlight sampling keyboard.

From a musical point of view, and taking into account her amazing singing, if I were to compare her to another female musician, it would be Joni Mitchell. Not because of styles, because Joni's is rooted in folk-rock via LA studio/country/jazz, but because of how profoundly she influenced the musicians that followed her.

Bear in mind that Kate was also the first rock/pop artist to combine dance and music in a live show, presaging Madonna and the others by a good 10 years.

Anyway, the amazing thing about this song is that Kate wrote it when she was 14. In fact, it was part of the demo she put together for Dave Gilmour (of the Floyd) who discovered her.

What's even more amazing is how presciently in control of her early career she was, refusing to put this song out as her first single, instead choosing Wuthering Heights.

The virtue of Blind Faith

Blind Faith were the first "Supergroup", yada, yada.

Important for two reasons: firstly in the 60's there were 4 great rock drummers: Ringo, Moon, Mitch Mitchell and Ginger Baker (John Bonham really didn't arrive until the 70s), and Ginger might have been the most Jazz oriented of the lot. Unfortunately, this was his last good recording until 1986.

Second, with Blind Faith, Clapton made the transition to Fenders from Gibsons. Here he's playing a Telecaster like Muddy Waters. He would end up being forever associated with Stratocasters (Blackie), even though his most important recordings with Mayall & Cream were all done with Gibsons.

Anyway, it's amazing to me that an album with only 2 great songs ("Find my way home" and "Presence of the Lord"), was so lauded, but as I mentioned before with the Zappa clip, it was a time when Rock musicians were starting to be treated as artists, and encouraged to experiment and collaborate, even if their milieu was based on a more traditional form (in this case Blues). It's a shame they only recorded one album together.

Political campaigns and guitar solos

Keith Moon once said that the most important thing about a guitar solo is how you start, and how you finish. I think the same thing holds true of political campaigns.

Tonight, Barack Obama gave one of the great speeches in American political history, the opening phrase, I guess, of the last part of his guitar solo. Even I was impressed, and you get the feeling that even better speeches are yet to come.

In the words of Bill Murray: "He came, he saw, he kicked ass"

Premature adulation

This made me laugh out loud.

Knowing Steve Jobs, though, I'd bet money that he'll get some people together to make sure his obituary is *just right*, ensuring a dignified and elegant shuffling off of these mortal coils. After all, the man is legendary for his refined good taste.

The only issue is his control freak nature. The Pearly Gates might be too much for him. Heaven would probably have to rename them to the Pearly Lasseters or something to keep him happy in the afterlife.

None of you understand. I'm not locked up in here with you. You're locked up in here with me

Sometimes I really hate the human race, as a whole. This following quote from Watchmen really captures how I feel.

"Stood in firelight, sweltering. Bloodstain on chest like map of violent new continent. Felt cleansed. Felt dark planet turn under my feet and knew what cats know that makes them scream like babies in night.

Looked at sky through smoke heavy with human fat and God was not there. The cold, suffocating dark goes on forever and we are alone. Live our lives, lacking anything better to do. Devise reason later. Born from oblivion; bear children, hell-bound as ourselves, go into oblivion. There is nothing else.

Existence is random. Has no pattern save what we imagine after staring at it for too long. No meaning save what we choose to impose. This rudderless world is not shaped by vague metaphysical forces. It is not God who kills the children. Not fate that butchers them or destiny that feeds them to the dogs. It’s us. Only us. Streets stank of fire. The void breathed hard on my heart, turning its illusions to ice, shattering them. Was reborn then, free to scrawl own design on this morally blank world.

Was Rorschach."

Plate or shrimp, or plate of shrimp.

"The more you drive, the less intelligent you are"

Late nite Zappa

Inca Roads, from the One Size fits All record.

There was a time when bands like this had an audience, because the music industry and specifically the music press were devoted both to the notion of rock music as a true artistic form, and to the nurturing of musical experimentation and diversity. Nowadays bands are judged more on how cool or street they are.

I don't think it's possible anymore for a band on a major label to deliver a record with this kind of sensibility.
Oh, and did I mention I have been hopelessly and eternally in love with Ruth Underwood, since I was 15.

The 2

If U2 are this generation's Beatles, then "New Years Day" is their "She loves you".

Like the Beatles, U2 started with a sound rooted in their own sensibility, and then later embraced a more straight rock & roll, black American influence. Edge continues to astonish and mesmerize me with the simplicity, soul and invention of his playing and sonic choices.

Late night Bach

There are some performers who can do no wrong, and Glenn Gould falls into that category, for me, when he's playing Bach. The Aria to the Goldberg Variations is one of my favorite pieces of music. Gould's performance is so sparse that it reveals an underlying and inherent beauty that other performances tend to miss.

Late night Cooder

"Bop till you drop" was the first digitally recorded album, back in 1978. It's interesting to me that a performer like Ry Cooder, who is so much about the feel and pulse of music, rather than any expression of technique, would be the first artist to cross that line. The album itself is, of course, amazing, and has in Cooder and David Lindley two of my all time favorite and biggest influential guitar players.

This song turned me onto Cooder when I was younger, and was the only thing of his I had heard until I went to college.

Handing over the Olympics..

2012 is the year the Apocalypse is supposed to arrive, according to the Mayans, and I can't think of a more appropriate place to hold the Olympics of that year than London.

I didn't watch the Olympics, because of how lousy and jingoistic NBC's coverage of that event is. I should remind the executives at the Peacock channel that the Olympics are supposed to be a celebration of humanity as a whole, and not an opportunity for internal reinforcement of your xenophobic views about the rest of the world.

I am amused, though, where every other country ranks the medal table according to gold medals won, the media in this country does it according to total medals won. I have to say, this country is becoming more like the old communist Soviet Union every day, and that's not a good thing

Anyway, since the Chinese have handed over the torch to the British, it seemed appropriate to show this old Steve Hackett tune.

The commoditization of spy hardware.

A UK company called QinetiQ has built a solar powered plane, that has been able to fly non-stop for nearly 84 hours, which is a significant achievement. QinetiQ's main market for this is supposedly UAV type aircraft for surveillance.

While the plane's current flight ceiling is 60,000 ft, it's pretty clear that 100,000 ft is not too far off, and what that means is a UAV that can fly above any territory without being shot down, since it will fly beyond the range of almost any air-to-air or surface-to-air missile. In essence this is a poor man's spy satellite, and in some respects superior since one can come close to the benefits of a geosynchronous orbit, without actually having to be in high orbit.

The Simpsons title sequence in real life

Saw this, had to share.

Frakking Sci-Fi Channel...

There was a time not too long ago, where the SciFi channel had SG1, Stargate Atlantis and Battlestar Galactica back to back to back on Friday nights, and it was ratings gold for that station. As of today, all three of those shows are set to conclude, with the cancellation of Atlantis.

I'm truly concerned for the future of the channel, and the original programming, especially given the way they've butchered Eureka. It doesn't look good.. If the current schedule is anything to go by, what we have to look forward to is an ongoing set of reruns of admittedly good shows (Star Trek NG, Stargate), lame-ass UK imports, ad-nauseam repeats of Ghost Hunters, crappy monster movies and wrestling.

This does not bode well, and moreover has the air of the SciFi channel execs basically telling their audience to go take a flying jump.

Let me make a clear point here. If the SciFi channel is going to abandon it's original programming, then there's no point to the channel's continued existence. None whatsoever. And it's a shortsighted policy in any case, from a business point of view, given how much the Stargate shows must surely make on syndication and in DVD sales. From NBC's (the parent company) point of view, the SciFi channel, when it's working properly should be an incubator or nursery of new, quirky and edgy shows, that push boundaries, while finding an audience. That Galactica doesn't have a 10pm slot sometime during the week or even the weekend, when shows like Heroes have proven that a significant audience exists for such programming, is an act of almost criminal negligence.

The real issue, imho, is that the executives at SciFi don't seem to understand or even like their audience, or how to market their product beyond basic cable and direct to video. They continually insult the intelligence of their audience. I say enough.

Mark Stern has a lot to answer for.

from the dept of I know how he feels

This made me laugh.. out loud.
Dude, I feel your pain.

Enthralled by the spectacle of decay..

Before he died George Carlin gave some interviews in which he basically said that his perspective changed when he stopped caring about the outcome of events, and just took humor and or pleasure in the grotesque way those events would unfold.

Now it's not clear to me, if you have people or things in this life that you care about, that it is possible to become completely detached from the world, and not be vested to some degree in the world at large (even if it's because you don't want your pet puppy to be mutilated and eaten by bands of rampaging zombies). Now to be fair, he did say that his stance might very well be the result of a brokenhearted idealist turned cynic.

But I have to say, speaking for myself, that viewing the world through such a jaundiced eye makes for a much less stressful life. Things are going to hell in a hand-basket, in a spectacular way, and nobody in charge seems to give a flying rats ass.

The Bible says that "The love of money is the root of all evil", and these greedy bastards are trying to take us all down, rejoicing in the distruction, viewing each and every thing that happens as some kind of business opportunity. Even Nero, who fiddled while Rome burned, was never so pernicious.

There is a line in Battlestar Galactica, where Adama says "We never asked ourselves whether we deserve to survive.". I used to think we did, and were worth saving. Now, I'm not so sure, and I'm beginning to think Nero might have had a point. My reason for living is now just to be here to witness it all.

Still if we do deserve redemption, the only way we will achieve it is to act decisively, and to understand that there are some things more important than money.

Dear SciFi Channel.

Enough with the bloody holiday Twilight Zone marathons already. 3 fricking days !!

The thing is, you guys have enough of a vault to do some interesting holiday programming, but it's this lack of imagination that's the reason your network mostly sucks. If it wasn't for Galactica (which ends this year), Stargate SG1 (which you cancelled, and won't allow to continue on another network) and Eureka I wouldn't even watch. And don't get me started on the EC-fracking-W, or the lameass made for TV movies.

Hell, until the writers strike, the USA channel was doing just as much interesting SciFi as you guys with Dead Zone and the 4400.

All I want is for you to raise your standards. Just a little.. Is that too much to ask ?

More on Oil and Engines

I guess the implicit part of my previous posts is that diesel engines tend to be much more efficient than corresponding gasoline engines, with many diesel cars able to reach high 30's/low 40's mpg, as opposed to the mid 20's mpg for gasoline engines.

It's clear that if we are to adopt agrofuels, then diesel seems to be an easier step in that direction. The only issue for drivers seems to be the need for that visceral feel caused by great acceleration, and in some cases auto manufacturers have addressed that problem to a significant degree, so that most drivers will be happy with the acceleration they'll get. This is already true in Europe, the home of the no speed limit autobahn.

Fiddling while Rome burns..

I saw this story on Huffington Post. Apparently a lot of us have been taking the stimulus checks from the IRS, and have gone to get ourselves stimulated in other ways as apparently many internet porn sites have experienced 20%->30% growth (yes I get the joke), in what is usually a quiet period for the market.

As a nation, we are such a bunch of adolescents. And no-one is going to clean up after us. Just remember that.

The New Oil

One thing Oil companies are very good at is Chemical Engineering, or the construction of large plants to deal with the production of basic raw materials and fuel from crude oil, and this would be a critical advantage in the future against smaller silicon valley funded startups.

It occurs to me that the biggest problem in adopting algae and similar methods for creating biofuel is in scaling production to a point where single factories can produce hundreds of thousands of barrels of bio-diesel or bio-gasolene per day, on a managable footprint of land. So if the Oil companies want to maintain their monopoly, and continue to leverage their stranglehold on distribution, this would seem to be a way to do it.

The issue they have is the same one Google faces with it's data centers, which is to find a cheap and plentiful source of energy (and water in the Oil companies' case). Once they have that, the problem that remains is how to build the worlds largest still, and how to dispose/reuse their waste.

Furthermore, it is critical to the future of the Oil companies that they both behave and are seen to behave as good corporate citizens. What they means in a practical sense is oil/gasolene price stability. $4/gallon isn't a problem per se, given that most of Europe pays twice that. It's that we went from $2/gallon to $4/gallon in under four years, and that price "shock" has been the disruptive factor.

No sympathy for the car companies.

I reading this post and it occurs to me that all of Detroit's problem rest at their own feet. We all saw this coming.

It's clear that with just a little planning, Ford and the others would have been able to shift factory production from SUVs to smaller, more compact and efficient vehicles. And remember, these are multinational companies, and in those foreign already sell models that would more than meet the market demand for more economic vehicles. European standards for emissions and crash worthiness are far more stringent than in this country, and everybody with the exception of the British and the Irish drive on the left, removing *any* need for reengineering in the drivetrain.

The real problem is that the big Three got greedy, trying to maximize the per unit revenue on their automobiles. They spent their time complaining about emissions and efficiency standards instead of paying attention to the market, identifying opportunities and thinking longterm. Toyota did all that, and is now poised to dominate the market.

The solution for Detroit is clear:

1. Accelerate R&D, and segment vehicle design into stages. It costs a lot to put a new car into production, but much less to do the design work. It's clear that making sure they had some "dry powder" ready to go would have benefitted them
   
2. Invest in supercomputing technologies, and do more in the way of design automation and exploratory design. This speaks to 1) but Detroit's designs are *stale*. Virtual prototyping is an imperative.
   
3. Update Computer Aided Design methodologies.
   
4. Engineer factories to be capable of flexible. multi-model manufacturing. In particular, allow for efficient short-run builds. Do this, and if a model becomes popular, it should be straightforward to scale up production.
   
5. Spend more on engine and powertrain R&D, and focus on efficiency.
6. Bring the design to market cycle down to 18 months or less.

Detroit complains about the unions, but in truth, management's relationship with the unions has always been feudal and adversarial. The Unions have two primary goals: preserve jobs and preserve wages and benefits, in that order. Provided management doesn't rub the unions noses in the shit, as they have in the past, by awarding themselves large bonuses while laying off production line workers, they should be able to come to a mutually satisfactory agreement.

Relative equality of management and production line workers, more than TQM, Taguchi methods or the like, has always been central, imho, to Japan's superiority in the automobile business. It's clear that in Japan, decisions are made to benefit the company as a whole, and it is considered highly dishonorable for one group to benefit from the misfortune of another. Somehow, Amercan management doesn't seem to have that ethical clarity, and it has cost those companies dearly.

I was wrong about McCain

I should not under any circumstances underestimate the degree to which the establishment will go to protect McCain. The floozy incident seems like a dim, distant memory.

These fuckers would rather reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.

George Carlin is dead.

Along with Bill Hicks and Richard Pryor, one of my three comic heroes.

Aside from actually dying, the one thing I think he'd regret would have been to miss out on watching our "civilization" finally burst into flames when the collapse finally comes. I think even he would have been awed by the spectacle of destruction, but he would have still laughed his ass off.

Despite his curmudgeonly and sardonic demeanor though, I think deep down he truly gave a crap. Cynics are just romantics whose eyes have been poked out with a sharp stick.

We've lost a great man in the war against the forces of darkness.

Ziggy Stardust: exobiologist.

For someone who was such a magpie of other peoples musical styles, David Bowie could be stunningly original when he put his mind to it.

He was probably the most influential musician in the UK during the 70's and 80's, when more people started bands because of listening to him than anyone else. And certainly the greatest exponent of Rock Theatre ever.

Prog Monday

They wrote this song in the late 60's. Still relevant.

Sunday Stax

The incomparable Sam and Dave:

The journey of 1000 miles beings with a single step.

We beat the Spurs. And it was a good win. Because we didn't have to shoot the lights out, nor did we have to play perfect basketball to do it. We shut them down in the 4th and did to the Spurs what they've being doing to us (and everyone else) for the last few years.

This is how you win championships in the NBA, by being better than the other team when you're both firing on only 3 cylinders.

Still, we're going to see a few more bad games from the Suns before this all settles down. Just remember that this game is a reminder of why Steve K. and Mike D. made the trade.

Holdsworth in Guitar Player

Allan is on the cover of this months (apr 08) edition of Guitar Player. It's a great interview.

Anyhoo, here's something to keep you warm:

Bill Evans

One of the last things he recorded before he died. Just as a point of note, there's a lot of good jazz based on film or tv songs. Coltrane did "My Favorite Things". The melodies are simple and hummable, and the harmony is easily expanded.

The Suns.

This is going to take a while.

I'll say this: there have been tantalizing moments, such as the Celtics game and the 1st half of the Blazers game where the Suns have been transcendentally good, and other games such as the Pistons game, where they've been atrociously bad. They might have won an extra game or two through this stretch with Shawn, but it would have been almost as bad: there's a malaise in the locker room thats been there since the start of the season.

Hillarys experience

Hillary Clinton talking about her experience in the White House would be like Linda McCartney talking about her experience as the keyboard player in Wings. Linda was in Wings for 15 years, and at the end of it she still couldn't play.

In either case, the husband was the star attraction.

I'll say this for Linda: she at least had the decency and good taste not to put out a solo album.

Blind Faith

They only made one album, which has two absolute classic songs.
This is one of them.

Luxury Keef.

This is almost too funny for words.
Of course, the real question is whether Louis Vuitton is going to make those handbags and such out of Keefs hide. Alligators everywhere are breathing a sign of relief.

Dirty tricks and all that.

Reading the blogs, I'm amused by Hillary supporters complaining about dirty tricks done by the Obama campaign.

Just for the record: comparing Obama to Hillary on this count is like comparing toe-nail fungus to full blown systemic lymphatic cancer. There's a huge world of difference between the two.

Now that's not to say I don't think Hillary wouldn't be a highly competent president. But it would be a soulless administration, ideologically rigid and bereft of any humanity, the occasional fake crying notwithstanding.

I'm just saying.

Midnight Mozart.

Jeff Healey, RIP

Amazing player, with a totally unique approach to rock. And the man could rock.
I am saddened by his passing.

Bill Hicks, 14th anniversary of his passing.

Bill Hicks is my hero.

He never ran away or apologized for his vices or his point of view. He confronted his enemies and his audiences with equal vigor, and never compromised. ever. His anger and indignation with the world, our politicians, our stupidity and the selling of our collective souls was real and palpable.

He passed away on Feb 26th 2004, and he is missed.

This tribute is in 3 parts.

pt 1.



pt 2.



pt. 3