Articulated Starfish: The Temporal Lobes and Religous Experineces

An intriguing video in which neurologist Ramachandran, investigates the relationship between temporal lobe epilepsy and profound religious experience.

Mister Goldbug, Guest Contributer.

Hello all. This is Mercury Toona's Guest Contributor. I joined this blog after accepting an invite extended to me from Shane. I hope this is the beginning of a very fruitful relationship between you the reader and we the bloggers.

So prepare to be educated and stimulated by esoteric knowledge that will have the attack dogs of tyranny salivating for a government-regulated Internet.

It's poetic justice really. What we have here is an instrument that was created by the government to transmit information long distances in short time period now used by the oppressed to communicate revolution that America's Founding Father Thomas Jefferson told us was necessary every twenty five years.

Articulated Starfish: Noam Chomsky

Tainted Lunch Meat : Taxes and how not to pay them

First, I meant to make that last post from this account, but I was screwing around with the ads and forgot to log out, my apologies. Secondly, I just read an article from the Washington Post that I came across on HuffPo that details how some banks, the same ones we just bailed out, are looking to swindle taxpayers out of just over $100 billion. Classy. Apparently the Treasury inserted five sentences that swept away a 20+ year old tax policy. This change may have been illegal to boot. Seems to be arguments on both sides of that. Regardless of it's legality, it seems like a shitty thing to do to the people who just tried to save your ass. Some banks have already taken advantage of the new policy, and saved themselves from having to pay taxes on their mergers with other banks, due to the losses on the books of the purchased banks. If the taxpayers weren't paying through the nose on these bail outs, and quite possibly financing these mergers, I could possibly be OK with the tax policy change. But under the circumstances, fuck 'em. Figure out how to make them pay what they owe, if we financed the mergers, give us our cut.

Tainted Lunch Meat : On martial law and comedy

Confronting comedy first; it shouldn't be a problem for comedians to come up with material. He does have those ears and let's face it, to err is human, the guy isn't jesus(no one ever was). I'm sure he will make mistakes, both large and small, and I'm sure most credible comedians will shame him like any other politician. Obama seems to have a good sense of humor as well, smiles a lot, chuckles heartily, whatever.

Next up, martial law. The video clip, short doc or whatever you want to call it, definitely straddles the conspiracy theory line. If by straddling the line you mean being completely on the conspiracy theory side of the line, then yes, definitely straddling it. I only say that due to the origins of the doc. Are there some serious concerns presented, of course. Will we see a military coup take place on our soil, I'm not sure I would bet on that. Mainly because it's unnecessary, there are more subtle ways to control the population. Propaganda on the news, over-armed police forces, unreasonable fear of the next bogey-man, religion, and so on. As long as we continue to support one side or the other of the same coin, martial law is largely a non concern. If there's ever a true showing of popular dissent, then we may be in trouble, as the infrastructure is already in place to control the people by force.

Finally a few trends I've noticed. Apparently Palin is to the republican party as Neo was to the Matrix, The One. Embracing the new president elect is fashionable to conservatives until a new viable strategy to defeat democrats reveals itself. Excommunicating anyone who throws Palin under the bus within conservative circles is A OK. Claiming that Obama won the election because he is actually a center-right candidate is entirely not directly at odds with the "Don't-vote-for-the-socialist-terrorist-muslim-marxist-liberal" attacks that were all over the place just days and weeks before. There's some serious cognitive dissonance riding shotgun with wishful thinking.

Tainted Lunch Meat : Alcohol

So I tried some Absinthe. Delicious. But I like licorice. If by chance you do not licorice, Absinthe may not be for you. The anise is strong in this one. Sort of sticks to you. A strong drink to be sure, even diluted with four parts water. Which made for a nice milky green tinted drink. I only had one drink, which was just fine. Could have handled a few more easily, but I was tired. Plus it is 140 proof. Having six or more of those would probably be fun and could potentially make for a miserable day when you wake up. Hope to find out during further research. The color is amazing before and after you dilute the drink. The taste is perhaps an acquired one, but it shouldn't be too hard to acquire after one or two drinks. In fact I think most things could taste OK after a few of those. Hallucinatory effects seem to have been overstated throughout it's history. Perhaps a lower grade Absinthe with sketchy ingredients could be the trick. More updates to come. Hopefully. Maybe.

Fishin' for Bobby: Obama not funny

While I was reading another blog I had fount on google news, it had mentioned that comedians will have a hard time for their political jokes. The reason being, they feared that the 44th president wouldn't have any mistakes or do something politically incorrect for them to joke about. In my opinion, I find a good joke to lighten up my day but the fact that people would infact want their president to screw up; well it's just mind boggling. I think some comedians shouldn't focus on Obama screwing up and just come up with some orignal content and not pray for their nation's leader to be caught with his pants around his ankles mooning the Washington monument. Anyways, if you'd like to read the same article/blog I did, here's the link: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/the_big_picture/2008/11/no-drama-obama.html

martial law (?)

so a friend emails me the following link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgMx2F41XD0 - if it doesn't work for you and you're intrigued, search 'corbettreport' on youtube - the title of the short is:

U.S. Army prepares to invade U.S.

which begs many questions, and, if you are like me, may make you uneasy and a little scared.

i haven't had a chance to check on no. 1955, the 'continuity of government' plans, or anything else, but the short doc is convincing, and not unthinkable.

although it could be argued that it straddles the fence of conspiracy theory.

i've realized lately how little i am truly involved in anything politically or socially relevant.

watching this provides a certain motivation.

and then i can't help but think how easily martial law could be implemented were it done quietly and slowly.

it makes one wonder what kind of system one is trapped in - and how to escape, or, better yet, change it.

Tainted Lunch Meat : Games

Downloaded the Mirror's Edge demo for the 360 over the weekend. Quite impressed. Very clean and bright look to the game. Controls were not too difficult to get the hang of, although not really intuitive either(jumping with the left trigger seemed odd). The training part of the demo was a bit of a bore, absolutely necessary though. The level you get to play is rather enjoyable, but nearly as soon as the training wheels come off it's game over. Definitely seems like the game has potential. As unique a take on an FPS as I've ever played. The combination of the visual style and the unique game play seems to work well. Can't wait to buy it next year when it hits the bargain bins.

Tainted Lunch Meat : Public Broadcasting

Neat program on PBS the other night. All about fractals, Benoit Mandelbrot and forests.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/fractals/