| How Google Searches Itself Google has become one of the hottest companies in Silicon Valley by helping millions of Internet users search the Web smarter and faster. But how does this wildly popular search engine find the new ideas that will keep its business moving forward? By ''googling'' itself. by Fara Warner photographs by Kate Powers from FC issue 60, page 50 Most Fridays at Google, the search-engine company in Mountain View, California, Marissa Mayer and about 50 engineers and other employees sit down to do a search of their own. Mayer, an intense, fast-talking product manager, scribbles rapidly as the engineers race to explain and defend the new ideas that they've posted to an internal Web site. By the end of the hour-long meeting, six, seven, or sometimes even eight new ideas are fleshed out enough to take to the next level of development. Some of those ideas might become new features on Google, new code or search algorithms, or a new way to juice up the Google home page. "We really jam in there," Mayer says. And jam they must. Google has taken its place as the leader of Internet search engines, answering 40% of the estimated 375 million queries thrown out on the Net each day. But newcomers ( such as Teoma and WiseNut ) are looking to unseat Google by promising solutions that are better and faster. To stay on top, Google needed a stream of new ideas. But where could the company look for them? And more important, how? "We always had great ideas, but we didn't have a good way of expressing them or capturing them," says Craig Silverstein, Google's director of technology. Mayer's proposal: Search for ideas in the same way that the Google search engine combs the Web. Google's Web searches succeed because they roam far and wide, scouring billions of documents. Also, search results are ranked by relevance taking into account how many links a page has, among many other factors ), and they come back fast. Google's idea search starts with an internal Web page that takes minutes to set up. Using a program called Sparrow, even Google employees without Internet savvy ( there are a few ) can create a page of ideas. That enables the company to cast its net across its 300-plus employees. "We never say, 'This group should innovate, and the rest should just do their jobs,' " says Jonathan Rosenberg, vice president of product management. "Everyone spends a fraction of their day on R&D." The easy-to-use intranet also benefits those tech-savvy Google employees who aren't always the most vocal participants in meetings. "There's an engineer here who's very quiet," says Mayer. "He has lots of ideas, but he feels better about writing them down. Once his thoughts are out on the intranet, they get discussed, and by the time the forum comes around, I can get him to come out of his shell." Mayer combs the site daily, searching for relevant ideas. She digs out the ones that generate the most comments and that seem the most doable. Relevance isn't necessarily measured by how much money an idea makes; it's more about making Google searches better. "Sales may say that we need a certain feature," Mayer explains. "But great technology usually comes from somebody who's spent a year hacking a problem. You can't force technical innovation." In the Friday meetings, Mayer insists on speed. The sessions are kept to one hour, and individual presenters never get more than 10 minutes. But everyone knows that the conversation won't end when the meeting does. Promising ideas are quickly outlined on the intranet site. Usually, the person who came up with the idea is put in charge of turning it into a feature. "I never have to hammer on people," says Rosenberg. "They showcase their ideas and then move on them." Two recent examples include a news-search feature that debuted earlier this year and a pilot project that keeps track of persistent searches on the Web. "You can take Google's temperature just by going to the intranet site," Rosenberg says. "It's a window to everyone's soul." ----------- ------------- http://fastcompany.com/online/34/ideazone.html We've moved beyond email, beyond intranets, to the next digital force that will reshape how people work and how they relate to their companies. Oliver Muoto, cofounder of Epicentric Inc., explains the rise of B2E Web portals. by Eric Ransdell photographs by Bill Reitzel from FC issue 34, page 366 First came email. The ability of anyone in an organization to send messages to anyone else at any time didn't just make communication faster -- it changed the nature of organizational life. With more people than ever in the loop on critical decisions, people who had relevant information or powerful ideas had a better chance than ever to influence the outcome of those decisions. Hierarchies of position gave way to hierarchies of expertise. Then came intrane ts. Companies are ever-changing collections of business units, R&D programs, project teams, marketing campaigns, HR initiatives -- all of which, until the rise of the Web, were invisible to most of the people who worked at those companies. Creating one-click-away archives of PowerPoint presentations made by a company's sales staff, or of status reports on a company's new-product team, didn't just make sharing work easier -- it made the entire company more transparent. People who had never gone on a sales call could see for themselves how the company was presenting itself to customers; people whose work was affected by a particular team could look directly at what that team was doing. Oliver Muoto believes that we will soon experience the next great wave of digitally driven change. Leading that wave will be new services that he calls "B2E business-to-employee ) portals" -- or, more simply, "people portals." Think MyYahoo! for your company. A people portal is a customized, personalized, ever-changing mix of news, resources, applications, and e-commerce options that becomes the desktop destination for everyone in an organization -- and the primary vehicle by which people do their work. "Each person's 'start page' reflects a unique view of the world -- a set of requirements and desires, of likes and dislikes," Muoto says. "At the same time, everyone is using the same basic services, and that improves the cohesion of the company. The user -- in other words, the employee -- is in charge: It's not 'the company'; it's 'my company.' " Muoto, 30, is cofounder of Epicentric Inc., a San Francisco-based outfit that is helping a growing number of high-powered clients to develop B2E portals. Its killer app is a collection of 200 "modules" that accelerate the process of designing and deploying such portals. Some of those modules are Web-software building blocks. Others hinge on content partnerships -- deals with Web companies to provide news headlines, stock quotes, or weather reports. "You have to deliver a wide range of functionality, and you have to deliver it fast," Muoto says. "People expect more than what most intranets offer. They want more than just links. They want news. They want applications. They want commerce. And they want all of it their way." Muoto understands this impatient mind-set firsthand. A fast-talking, fast-walking bachelor ( did we mention that he has been named one of the most eligible men in Silicon Valley? ), he is the son of a Polish mother and a Nigerian father. He was educated in Nigeria before attending the University of Southern California, where he first indulged his entrepreneurial spirit by organizing a student dry-cleaning service and a marketing business that sold ads on local cable stations. As soon as he received his diploma, he headed for Silicon Valley -- and life as a self-confessed "startup junkie." In 1997, after working at five other startups, Muoto teamed up with his friend Ed Anuff to launch Epicentric. The company, with four offices across the country, now has more than 70 clients, including Autodesk, Lockheed Martin, Motorola, and Sun Microsystems. Its chief investors include France Telecom and Reuters. In a series of interviews with Fast Company, Muoto explained the power of people portals. What's the difference between a company intranet and a people portal? An intranet is a collection of links to various resources -- most of them internal, some of them external -- that may be useful to people in a company. Let me emphasize the word "may." Most intranets capture what leaders in the company think is important: They reflect a top-down view of what's happening in the organization. And very few intranets are designed with the user experience in mind. The attitude is "It's work, right? So why worry about making the intranet as much fun, or as colorful, or as easy to navigate, as the most popular commercial Web sites?" Let's be honest. When the Web came along, lots of companies just took their existing applications, spent a few million dollars to create a Web user interface, and -- presto! -- they had an intranet. A B2E portal is a centralized starting point for everyone in an organization. It uses the Web to bring together a wide range of applications, services, content options, and e-commerce tools, and it allows users to personalize those offerings in ways that make sense to them. If you've got 5,000 people in your company, you might have 5,000 different "start pages," with each one based on what people need to do their work, what they need in order to track developments in the outside world, and what their outside interests happen to be. A real B2E portal has three characteristics. First, it has one point of entry -- one and only one URL. Second, it gives you not just company propaganda, but everything that you want. And third, it is uniquely your own. You decide what you see and how you see it. You influence both the substance and the style of presentation. Paint a picture for us. I work in a company with a people portal, and I arrive at the office at 8 AM. What's on my desktop? The first thing that you see is your start page -- your personal window into the company and into the world. On your start page, you see a bunch of modules: "My Company," "My Department," "My Stuff." The content of each module -- information updates, links to key sites -- is based on choices that you've made about what you need to do your job. Your company may support hundreds of R&D projects, but you may be personally involved in just five of them. Instead of having to navigate a generic intranet site for your R&D group, you can create links and sign up for updates that relate only to those five projects. You may be in sales and need to track what your three biggest competitors are doing. So you choose an information service and a stock-price service for just those companies. You may have a four-year-old daughter whom you worry about even more than you worry about your competitors. So you arrange for your start page to include a link to a video feed from her day-care center. People have different needs, different interests, different worries. Their start pages should reflect those differences. But the really important thing about a B2E portal isn't what's on each person's desktop. The really important thing is what B2E portals say about the future of work -- and about the way that people relate to their company and to one another. So what's the logic behind a B2E portal? Here's the first point: B2E portals have to be compelling to the people who use them. Every day, companies are competing for the eyeballs of their employees with eBay, Yahoo!, and thousands of other Web sites. We all know that a huge percentage of traffic to consumer Web sites comes from people who are connecting to the Net at the office. That actually makes sense. We think about work when we're home, and we deal with our lives when we're at work. So a portal needs to address the whole person -- as an employee, as a colleague, as a consumer, as a parent, as a community member. Why pretend that people are one way at home and another way at work? Let them use a B2E portal to meet all of their needs. With many of our installations, users can choose modules that feature news headlines, sports scores, stock updates, and weather reports. We even offer a horoscope module. You have to think about your employees in the way that Yahoo! thinks about its customers. You may not be competing for their business in the way that Yahoo! is -- but you are competing for their attention. I suppose that you can try to "stop" people from checking on their eBay auctions while they're at work, and then you can put out an email memo about your latest HR applet and urge people to check that out instead. In reality, of course, it's virtually impossible to force anyone to do anything these days -- especially on the Web. The way that you persuade people to spend their time on your B2E service is by creating a service that's so useful, so relevant, so compelling, that they actually want to spend time there. That's an appealing vision, but I can already hear the objections: The inmates are running the asylum! A B2E portal reflects a new view of the relationship between an organization and its people. You can't force people to look at your company the way that you want them to. It makes no sense to spend millions of dollars on a Web-based application, only to discover that no one uses it. At the same time, it's entirely reasonable to have certain expectations of your people. The workplace keeps getting more democratic, but people in a democracy still have certain responsibilities. Here's a relatively minor example. Our stock-quote module allows users to choose the stocks that they want to track. But a company can also provide a list of stocks that must be on every employee's tracking list -- its biggest competitors, for example, or its best customers. That's perfectly fair: Companies have a right to expect their people to be well informed about that kind of thing. Here's a more significant example, one that comes up often. Companies care a lot about their brands. And, when it comes to branding, we know that design matters and that projecting a corporate brand within a company is no less important than projecting it through external marketing materials. So lots of companies say, "People can choose the content that they need, but everyone's page has to 'look and feel' like the company." That's fair too, and our tools allow companies to set parameters: "No, you can't change the color scheme. Yes, that information must be displayed in three columns." Ultimately, the user has to win. People have to be able to get the resources that they need to do their jobs. But companies still need to control some basic issues: design, security, integrity. This isn't about anarchy; it's about shared control. One beef about intranets is that they take so long to deploy. IT departments don't exactly work in Internet time. Don't you worry that if you conjure up a compelling vision of a B2E portal, people are going to get frustrated as they wait for it to materialize? The biggest question that we face from our Fortune 500 clients is "How can we act more like a dotcom company? How can we become a faster company?" Our answer is that they need to embrace a B2E portal. The deployment cycle for traditional enterprise software can last 9 months. The deployment cycle for a portal can be as short as 30 days. That's why we've developed all of these modules. You can take our packaged content modules, use our existing software, and get a portal up and running very quickly. Our recent experience with Motorola offers a great example of how that works. Greg Goluska, vice president of customer support, was the leader of a team at Motorola that was creating a B2E portal. The team's first goal was to design a service that would treat employees like customers. Its second goal was to create a site that would become a single point of entry for all Motorolans. Finally, and most important, the team wanted the process of creating the portal to reflect the kind of organization that everyone at Motorola wants the company to become. So the design process had to be not only fast but also democratic. We holed up for three days at the Chicago Institute of Technology, with 60 Motorolans from around the world, along with engineers from Epicentric. We were there all day and most of each night. There weren't any fancy dinners; we just sent out for pizza. The group broke into small teams, and people talked about the really basic questions: What's on the minds of our customers -- in this case, employees? Who's best at doing this stuff already, and what can we learn from those people? Then teams created prototypes and subjected them to review. We called this process "Building the Straw Portal Review." We debated during the day, did the builds at night, and reviewed the results the next morning. At the end of the three-day exercise, the plan was presented to Motorola's CIO. Greg said, "This isn't just trying to change the company. This is trying to change the way that we change." And this isn't one-shot change. Once you've got a portal in place, small groups of people -- teams, departments, business units -- can make changes on their own. Do the people in your group want to work together more seamlessly? We have a module that enables users to create discussion groups. We also have a collaboration module that supports interactive chat. How else do B2E portals change the way that you think about people and technology? We're playing with lots of different ideas. For example, maybe you can change how you budget for investments in technology. Once you've got the basic portal infrastructure in place, you can have various departments "buy" advertising to "pay for" the portal. Big companies have lots of services that they provide to their employees: HR initiatives, a company store, a day-care center. A thriving B2E portal becomes a "channel" by which departments can promote those services, and the technology department can charge them for the opportunity to advertise there. Why does it always have to be a cost center? Why can't it be entrepreneurial too? Here's another idea: As I said earlier, any CEO who is honest about it knows that people are spending some time at work buying books from Amazon.com or bidding on memorabilia on eBay. That happens everywhere. Rather than complain about people shopping from their desk, why not turn it to your advantage? We offer an e-commerce group-buying module that features a series of pre-packaged deals with online vendors. All you have to do is sign up for it, and your employees will get discounts on all sorts of stuff. That option could become a new kind of employee benefit, and it would encourage people to keep working within the framework of the portal. If people come to the portal because they want to get a great deal on a gift, and if the page containing that deal also contains a quarterly financial report that your CFO wants everyone to read, then the chance of that report actually getting read will go up dramatically. Eric Ransdell ( ransdell@well.com ), a Fast Company contributing editor, is based in San Francisco. Contact Oliver Muoto by email ( oliver@epicentric.com ), or visit Epicentric Inc. on the Web ( http://www.epicentric.com ). ----------------- Arafat Calls for Democratic Elections in the United States (english) Rahul Mahajan 9:16pm Thu Jun 27 '02 (Modified on 9:52pm Thu Jun 27 '02) article#188724 Palestinian Authority President Yasir Arafat stunned the world yesterday by demanding that the United States hold democratic elections for a new Chief Executive before it attempts to continue in its role as broker between Israel and Palestine. "Mr. Bush is tainted by his association with Jim-Crow-style selective disenfranchisement and executive strong-arm tactics in a southeastern province controlled by his brother," said Mr. Arafat, who was elected with 87% of the vote in 1996 elections in the West Bank and Gaza, declared to be free and fair by international observers, including former U.S. president Jimmy Carter. "Our count shows that he would have lost the election if his associates hadn't deprived so many thousands of African-Americans, an oppressed minority, of the right to vote. He is not the man to bring peace to the Middle East." Hugo Chavez, elected president of Venezuela with 62% of the popular vote, concurred with Mr. Arafat. Chavez has long been a victim of Bush's anti-democratic attitude, as the Bush administration funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars through the "National Endowment for Democracy" to anti-Chavez forces and reportedly gave the go-ahead for an attempted military coup by those forces. "After it was over and I was back in power," said Chavez, "his administration actually told me 'legitimacy is not conferred by a majority vote.' Unless, of course, it's a majority of the Supreme Court. I respect the local traditions, however quaint, of the United States, but he hardly sets the best example for the Middle East, does he? Why don't we get back to that idea of an international conference to settle the question of Palestine?" Bush was not without his supporters, however. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, elected head of a country that legally discriminates among its citizens on the basis of religious belief, forbids political candidates from advocating an end to that discrimination, and disenfranchises an entire people through military occupation, dismissed the call as "absurd." Hamid Karzai, recently "elected" head of Afghanistan by a grand council, or "loya jirga," in which a foreign body, controlled by the United States, selected delegates; unelected warlords who had ravaged the country were permitted to control the meeting and to threaten delegates who refused to vote their way; and the U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan, Zalmay Khalilzad, refused to allow at least two other candidates to stand for election, added his support for Mr. Bush in his hour of need. Said Karzai, "In Afghanistan, we have the loya jirga. In the United States, you have your own process -- as we understand, it's traditional over there for corporations to play a large part in electing officials and writing legislation. We're very interested in looking into that kind of system ourselves." Vojislav Kostunica, chosen head of Yugoslavia in an election where the United States spent an estimated $25 million to influence the results, was also keen to rush to Bush's defense, indicating that he saw no procedural problems with the 2000 elections. And Mahathir Mohamad of Malaysia, long derided for his claim that "Asian culture" is at odds with universal human rights, added, "The elections are strictly an internal matter, and should have no bearing on the status of the United States as a broker. The Palestinians' high-handedness is a serious threat to national independence." In a surprise move, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, long an ally of the United States, supported Arafat's call, saying, "While we're at it, let's take another look at our agreement on American independence. George Washington was not only unelected, he did rather associate with terrorists. Benedict Arnold would have been a much more suitable partner for peace, n'est ce pas?" Arafat, busy working on a plan to find a new Israeli leader not tainted with the massacre of hundreds of innocents in Sabra and Shatila to negotiate with, could not be reached for further comment. www.counterpunch.org/mahajan0626.html add your own comments I.-ntellectual D.-unce F.-ources (english) Vish Varnay 9:52pm Thu Jun 27 '02 comment#188730 How many Israeli soldiers does it take to patrol the streets of Palestine? Answer: (3) One who can write. One who can read. And one to keep an eye on the other two intellectuals!! ------------------- Bakunin on Marx and the Jews (english) Mikhail Bakunin 8:05pm Thu Jun 27 '02 (Modified on 11:33pm Thu Jun 27 '02) article#188712 In his own words... "His vanity ... has no bounds, a veritable Jew's vanity.... This vanity, already very great, has been considerably increased by the adulation of his friends and disciples. Very personal, very jealous, very touchy, and very vindictive, like Jehovah the God of his people, Marx will not suffer that one should recognize any other God but himself; what do I say ? that one should even render justice to another Socialist writer or worker in his presence. Proudhon, who has never been a God, but who was certainly a great revolutionary thinker, and who rendered immense services to the development of Socialist ideas, became for this reason the bête noire of Marx. To praise Proudhon in his presence was to cause him a mortal offence worthy of all the natural consequences of his enmity; and these consequences are at first hatred, then the foulest calumnies. Marx has never recoiled before falsehood, however odious, however perfidious it might be, when he thought he could make use of it without too great danger for himself against those who had the misfortune to incur his wrath." "I begin by begging you to believe that I am in no way the enemy nor the detractor of the Jews. Although I may be considered a cannibal, I do not carry savagery to that point, and I assure you that in my eyes all nations have their worth. Each is, moreover, an ethnographically historic product, and is consequently responsible neither for its faults nor its merits. It is thus that we may observe in connection with the modern Jews that their nature lends itself little to frank Socialism. Their history, long before the Christian era, implanted in them an essentially mercantile and bourgeois tendency, with the result that, considered as a nation, they are par excellence the exploiters of other men's work, and they have a natural horror and fear of the popular masses, whom they despise, moreover, whether openly or in secret. The habit of exploitation, whilst developing the intelligence of the exploiters, gives it an exclusive and disastrous bent and quite contrary to the interests as well as to the instincts of the proletariat. I know that in expressing with this frankness my intimate opinion on the Jews I expose myself to enormous dangers. Many people share it, but very few dare publicly to express it, for the Jewish sect, very much more formidable than that of the Jesuits, Catholic or Protestant, constitutes today a veritable power in Europe. It reigns despotically in commerce, in the banks, and it has invaded three-quarters of German journalism and a very considerable portion of the journalism of other countries. Woe, then, to him who has the clumsiness to displease it!" -Mikhail Bakunin, noted Russian anarchist. add your own comments We are anarchists... (english) Circuit 9:36pm Thu Jun 27 '02 circuitry@post.com comment#188728 ...not Bakuninists. Mikey B. was notoriously anti-semetic, and it was one of his greatest flaws. However, his theories were not centered around anti-semetism. Many Jews have been anarchists, from Emma Goldman, to Murray Bookchin, to Noam Chomsky. We do not worship any single author or theoretician. This allows us to reject and accept different ideas from many different sources. Circuit www.infoshop.org/faq/ Thank You Circuit (english) m. 10:32pm Thu Jun 27 '02 comment#188734 Many people prefer a set of rules or principles that they can memorize to the central human task of making moral decisions that suit your unique moment in this universe. Bakunin speaks for his culture (english) puzzled 11:33pm Thu Jun 27 '02 comment#188737 The point also needs to be made that anti-semitism is hardly Bakunin's invention. Nor was it soley a Nazi invention. As a Canadian it doesn't exactly make me proud to know that German and Austrian Jewish men fleeing genocide were not allowed refuge in Canada, but instead imprisoned as German nationals alongside fascists and Nazis. In my view, all the western powers share a responsibility for the Holocaust. ---------------------- A palestinian-American's extended Family life: one day and more! (english) TruePeace 6:35pm Thu Jun 27 '02 article#188698 Sam Bahour is a Palestinian-American businessman living in the besieged Palestinian City of Al-Bireh in the West He is co-author of HOMELAND: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians (1994) Sam Bahour is a Palestinian-American businessman living in the besieged Palestinian City of Al-Bireh in the West Bank and can be reached at sbahour@palnet.com. He is co-author of HOMELAND: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians (1994). update............breaking the fear... We finally had a house visit of our cities uninvited guests. Sixteen fully armed Israeli soliders entered our home as part of the house to house searches that they have been carrying out for 4 days now in Ramallah, while we sit under 24-hr curfew. Our home compromises of 3 flats. My in-laws live on the ground level, we live on the 1st floor and my parents on the 2nd. My wife, Abeer, and oldest daughter, Areen, spent all day baking to fill the time while under house arrest (in international law they call that "collective punishment"). It was 7:30pm when Areen wrapped a tray of the sweet "Haresah" that had just come out of the oven and was excited to send it to her grandmother in the flat below. When we are under curfew, like now, we use a basket and rope from our front porch to send things below since we are not allowed out of the house. When the basket swings into the door my in-laws know that they should open to see what we have lowered. This time Areen was alone on the porch and started lowering the basket when she saw a soldier's helmet at her grandmother's doorstep after the basket was half way down. She hurried and pulled the basket up and in and left the window wide open. She came running saying the soldiers are in our house. She was scared, more than she has been since we became under curfew. I had just got off the phone with Corky, a New York Daily News reporter, and was at my computer. I went to the front window to see a lot of soldier's kneeling in front of the stone fence in front of our house. My dad happen to be with us at the time. As we sat to see what was going to happen our doorbell rang. When my wife answered via the intercom it was her mom saying that the soldiers are here and we should open the door. When we did no soldiers entered, only Fadwa, Abeer's mom. I met her in the stairway and she advised that they want one of us only to come downstairs. I proceeded to go see what was up. When I reached the doorsteps of my in-laws I looked in to see their porch packed tight with fully armed soldiers kneeling in a full alert position. One soldier was kneeling at the doorway and trained his rifle on me as I approached. I greeted them and asked what is needed. He asked me if I spoke Hebrew and I told him English or Arabic. He proceeded in perfect English and asked who was upstairs. I answered that my family and father were there. He demanded that everyone come outside in front of the house. I asked if the children should come too because the weather was a little cool. He snapped back and said "everyone". I yelled upstairs and asked my family to come down and bring their ID papers with them. As I waited the soldier asked my mother-in-law where was Marwan Barghouti, as if she should know. I told him that although my mother-in-law has the same last name they are not related. I told him each are from a different village. He said, sarcastically, "no this is Ramallah". I answered back and advised him that he was in Al-Bireh not Ramallah and that my in-laws are from Dir Ghasannah and Marwan was from a village called Kober. He seemed to be confused so I just answered his original question and told him Marwan was in "your jail". He smirked and seemed to accept the answer, which is true. My wife was now approaching with my daughters and father. Areen, my oldest daughter was shivering with fear. I held her and bought her in front of the soldiers who were absolutely crammed in the doorstep and porch all in the kneeling position, weapons pointed. I told her, "see they are just like us, they don't scare us." My father tried to comfort her too and told her the same. My father was itching to engage the soliders but we convinced him to pass this time so no one ended up sleeping in prison. Areen relaxed a bit, but did not say a word as the soldier in the doorstep demanded that my wife open the car garage. I told him the key was upstairs and she would need to get the key. He approved and as we sat waiting for Abeer I told the soldiers, " we have a long way to go yet." No one answered but 2 or 3 of the soldiers, young boys, shook their heads in agreement. We sat their looking at them, each looked as if they were fearing for there lives. They were in a foreign land in a stranger's house and had a whole Palestinian (that is terrorist) family in front of them. They just stared at us as we hugged our children trying to relax the shock and shed the fear. As Abeer came with the key to the garage two soldiers asked her to open the garage (in international law they call that being "a human shield"). As she opened our empty garage, the soldiers, full of fear, entered step by step guns ready to fire. I could not tell if they were disappointed that they fund only dust or if it was a relief to them. As the the two soldiers returned to the house, as we sat outside in the cool breeze, one soldier extended his hand with all of our ID's. My mother-in-law spoke to them in Arabic, she said, "maybe one day you will come back in time of peace and not be so scared". No one answered. The lead soldier called for the soldiers to exit the house. On his way past us he quickly said "bye", as if he knew had did something wrong by violating our life. They left, one by one, in full alert. It turns out they had searched and taken refuge in every home of the house not just the porch. As they exited gunfire could be heard a little way up our street. It was another Israeli unit for sure but they took no chances moving slowly and cautiously back to the street. As the walked past us, one by one, each with a heavy weapon or radio equipment or backpack, my daughter just hugged me tight. As the last soldier left the house my father-in-law emerged and stood at the top of the steps. Frustrated, he bid them farewell and told them in broken English, "Be sure to come back tomorrow." After they left we learned that they checked each room and closet of the first floor. We returned to our home and Areen was much more relaxed. She came to us and said, "you know I used to be scared of them but not anymore." She went on, "you know, some of them look like nice people. I feel sorry for them with all those jackets and gloves and helmets, they must be so hot, maybe that's why they did not talk to us." I assured her that I'm sure they are nice people but Sharon forced them to come. I am struggling to make sure she does not view every Israeli, even those that violate the security of our home, as the enemy. At last, the fear of those helmeted, armed soldiers running free in our streets has been broken. I was hoping for this day so my daughter will not live in fear of our future neighbors. Nadine my 2 year old daughter can hardly speak but she imitates the whole above episode in the most cutest accent and body language ever. As we settled down after our daily dose of occupation, we joked that they could have stayed since we had some of the best sweets in Al- Bireh to offer. More seriously, tonight we will give our girls an extra hug and kiss good night, because we know how today could of ended if one of the soldiers in the street saw Areen lower a basket above the head of the soldier entering the house. God help the next house they went to search. Still under military curfew, Sam Jobless in Gaza By Amira Hass Ha'aretz Unemployed Palestinians are mobilizing. A demonstration is planned for July 1 and organizers hope workers from southern Gaza will join in marching to Arafat's seaside bureau Unemployed workers in Khan Yunis are demanding that fruit stands be removed from the center of town because they are ashamed they can't afford to buy fruit for their children. "They don't have anywhere to go during the summer vacation," F. complains, "so they roam the streets and see the piles of red and orange and yellow and ask if they are entitled to some fruit. As a father, I'm so ashamed." The circle of unemployed workers begins to swell as each tries to outdo the other in explaining how unbearable the situation has become. One man searched through his pockets until he found a half-shekel coin together with an expired permit to work in Israel, which he still saves like a treasured memento. Another man said his Israeli boss owes him two months salary and is exploiting the closure to avoid paying him. A third man said that he had received his last salary via the bank but when he asked his employer if he was entitled to severance pay after three years of work, he was told "I didn't fire you, so it's not my responsibility." Nonetheless, he added, his employer in Bat Yam does send him a little money to tide him over until he can return to work. "We've sold everything in the house, nothing is left," someone else laments. The unemployed workers, most of whom had jobs in Israel until the intifada began, are starting to make their voices heard. About five weeks ago, workers in the northern Gaza Strip set up protest tents on the main road, Saladin, leading from the Erez crossing - one at the entrance to Beit Hanun, another on the road to Jabalya and a third inside Jabalya. "Why don't you protest in Gaza City, near the government offices? After all, almost no one passes by here." they were asked. The answer couldn't be more simple - they don't have the four shekels for the round trip to Gaza every day. Several members of the Palestinian legislative council visited them, made declarations, expressed support, and no more. The workers themselves came up with this initiative for protest tents and then contacted several activists in Palestinian non-government organizations. Gradually, additional protest tents were erected - in the Shati refugee camp, in Khan Yunis, and in the Nuseirat refugee camp. A demonstration is planned for July 1 and this time the organizers hope that unemployed workers from the southern Gaza Strip will join in marching to Arafat's seaside bureau. Committees have been organized and banners printed that proclaim "We want work and wages. We don't want handouts." In the protest tents and opposite the Palestinian legislative council building in Gaza, the protesters talked and argued with passersby, expressing nostalgia for the past and fears about the future. One person told this story: "The prophet Mohammed, peace be upon him, once saw a poor man sitting at the corner of the street. He asked who the man was and was told `He´s a Jew, a non-believer.´ The prophet said: `He used to work for you. Take him and attend to his needs.´" Others called out in response: "We built Israel. Who built Sharon´s ranch? We built it." Since 1967, Israel's economic policy regarding the territories, and especially the Gaza Strip, has been based on two principles - bringing cheap Palestinian labor into Israel and preventing the development of an independent economic sector in the territories. (The latter was achieved by restrictive laws and by blocking the development of infrastructure, despite the fact that Palestinians paid taxes to the state). So the families of those working in Israel achieved relative economic prosperity on a personal level, while the community as a whole remained economically backward. In Israeli in the 1970s it was hoped this economic dependence would prevent separation and that personal economic welfare would deflect any nationalist ideas about political independence. Even in the optimistic days of Oslo, economists explained that this dependence still existed and that even if development plans went ahead with a hitch, it would still require many years to create new jobs. Thus, economic stability in the territories - and especially in the Gaza Strip - depended on jobs in Israel. No one considered the possibility that this source of livelihood would disappear. Whenever someone in the crowd tried to point a finger toward the Palestinian Authority, there was always someone who tried to shut him up. "The Jewish journalist is just interested in criticism of the PA," someone argued. But then the opposite view gained strength, especially outside the Palestinian legislative council. "I'm not afraid, let them arrest me," one person said, "but I'll tell the truth." Last Wednesday, several Palestinian legislators looked out upon the demonstrators from a tall balcony and spoke words of encouragement. The workers looked from below and began losing patience. They silenced the speakers with shouts and by banging on pots. "Everyone talks - we don't believe them," the workers explained. "Write, write," they urged, "Why doesn't Palestinian television come to our tent? Why doesn't the Palestinian media write about us?" Representatives of the Palestinian's "Histadrut" - the Association of Palestinian Workers' Unions, were noticeable absent among the protesters. These union officials, who are Fatah members and get salaries from the PA, distributed what was called "an Arafat grant" to unemployed workers at the beginning of the intifada. But there were accusations that some of these "grants" were being passed on to associates of senior labor officials. These charges were difficult to prove, but reflected the widespread feelings of distrust. Disappointment was also in store of course for anyone who believed the Arab states would continue forever to pay unemployment compensation each month for the approximately 100,000 workers in the territories who were registered as workers in Israel. Workers are still asking, "Where is the money going?" and suspect that it's going into the pockets of senior officials. But the monthly donations of the Arab governments (and Europe) cover about 65 percent of the PA's operating budget and non- government contributions are transferred to a network of charitable organizations supervised by the Palestinian Interior Ministry. This month, the PA has not yet even paid the salaries of 125,000 public sector employees because the donations earmarked for this expense have not arrived. Many of these public sector employees were in need of food packages this month, just like the unemployed workers. Nonetheless, the poverty and despair of the unemployed workers is making them more suspicious and engendering exaggerated accusations: "When the wages of the officials are late by two weeks, they raise a tremendous cry to the heavens," one unemployed worker said. "But we're already 22 months without salaries." When a senior official appears before them and tries to convince them that "there's no money," the workers ask, "so how was he able to buy a plot of land now?" or "he sends his children abroad to study, while I can't even send my son to the Al-Quds Open University," or "he feeds his dog two chickens a day, and I don't remember the last time I was able to give my children chicken to eat." Since the early 1970s, the Israeli authorities have collected social security (bituah leumi) from the Palestinians at the same rate as Israeli workers. But individual Palestinians have received only a small part of these social security benefits (sick pay and worker's compensation). They did get unemployment benefits. When challenged in court on this policy, the state claimed that social security taxes collected from the Palestinians were collectively used for the development of the territories, but had difficulty documenting this allocation and development. The Oslo negotiators in 1994 decided that the social security collected in the past from Palestinians, together with the sums to be collected in the future, would be transferred to a special PA fund dedicated to the welfare of Palestinians employed in Israel. But the PA never created this fund and has never provided a clear answer to explain this neglect. Thus, the money the workers continued to pay for social security was never passed along by Israel to the PA. PA officials have kept a watchful eye on the protest activities of the unemployed workers, who say that the authorities have sent "spies" to their tents and that some of the activists have been promised jobs. The unemployed workers have set their hopes on the new finance minister, Salam Fiad, a native of Tul Karm who formerly represented the International Monetary Fund in the territories and is regarded as "an American appointment." Some of the workers noted that the Americans are interested in returning Palestinian laborers to Israel "because they understand how dangerous poverty is to stability." "On the border of the Gaza Strip, young people are killed by IDF fire and it is said that they were going to carry out a terror attack, but they were actually one their way to look for work," one man says. A resident of Jabalya, whose family came from a village where Kibbutz Dorot is now located, adds: "I don't want my land back. Land belongs to God. I want to work and live." A third man joins in: "Doesn't Israel understand how dangerous poverty is to everyone? Does Israel think it can throw us out? This situation makes everyone want to explode. I'm convinced that every one that blew himself up has an unemployed brother." http://www.haaretzdaily.com/hasen/ pages/ShArt.jhtml?itemNo=1806 31&contrassID=2&subContrass ID=5&sbSubContrassID=0&listSrc=Y Sam Bahour can be reached at sbahour@palnet.com. Sam Bahour is a Palestinian-American businessman living in the besieged Palestinian City of Al-Bireh in the West He is co-author of HOMELAND: Oral Histories of Palestine and Palestinians (1994) ------------- Systematic Pattern Of Rainfall Across U.S. Discovered Meteorologists have long known that summer thunderstorms and heavy rains are difficult to predict. They pop up quickly and disappear within a few short hours. But after looking at large numbers of radar images over four years, scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) have discovered a systematic pattern of rainfall across the continent, day after day. That knowledge should make the rainiest summer thunderstorms more predictable. The analysis of 50,000 summertime radar images showed that the movement of blocks of enhanced rainfall from west to east, from the Rockies toward the Appalachians, is an identifiable pattern, even when traditional weather maps show none of the typical weather patterns, such as fronts or low pressure systems. These eastward-moving blocks of enhanced thunderstorm activity still have individual storms popping up quickly and disappearing in a few hours, but it appears that the older storms give birth to new storms as the activity moves across the country. Thus, there is a much greater chance that a particular location will feel the effects of a thunderstorm when one of the activity areas is passing by, rather than either before or after it. "Heavy rain from thunderstorms is hard to predict because these storms are mostly local, don't last very long, and exhibit chaotic behavior in their evolution," said Richard Carbone, lead author of a paper appearing in the July 1 issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Atmospheric Science. "But our work shows some clusters of storms actually spawn new clusters of storms. If we can follow this pattern, we may be able to greatly improve our predictions of where the new storms will develop." A senior scientist at NCAR, Carbone and his colleagues applied sophisticated computer processing techniques to vast quantities of data containing radar imagery of summer thunderstorms between 1997 and 2000. By compiling the images, they found a distinct pattern of old storms generating new storms downstream. "We can track the signal associated with afternoon thunderstorms in the west to new thunderstorms across the country more than 500 miles on a typical midsummer day," added Carbone. "Some of these storms or 'episodes' last up to two days and 1,500 miles, even though ordinary thunderstorms last about an hour and organized groups of thunderstorms three to ten hours. You could say, for example, that yesterday's storms in Colorado have a lot to do with the likelihood of storms in Chicago today -- and watch out on the East Coast tomorrow!" Mountains and storm-created "waviness" in the atmosphere are mostly responsible for starting weather systems on their way across the country. But what links some of the thunderstorms together is still a mystery, said Carbone. "We haven't discovered the 'silver bullet' yet -- what ties these sequences of storms together -- but we've got some ideas," said Carbone. Ongoing research by Carbone and his collaborators includes looking more deeply into how these episodes of enhanced thunderstorm activity form and what controls the speed at which they propagate across the central United States. If the underlying mechanisms can be brought to light, that information can be used to improve forecasts of thunderstorm activity in the summer months. Carbone's thunderstorm research was funded primarily by the U.S. Weather Research Program. NCAR is a national research laboratory managed by a consortium of 66 universities offering Ph.D.s in the atmospheric and related sciences. NCAR's primary sponsor is the National Science Foundation. The AMS is the nation's leading professional society for scientists in the atmospheric and related sciences. [Contact: Richard Carbone, Anatta, Stephanie Kenitzer] 27-Jun-2002 ---------------- "Critt Jarvis"Date: Tue Mar 6, 2001 12:58 pm Subject: Re: [cea-usa] The Direct Democracy Amendment and Act Evan, I would like to volunteer time to the The National Initiative for Direct Democracy using the training and support I am about to receive From the Four Directions. I would be interested in setting up and participating in discussion groups related to the Initiative. fromthefourdirections.org/tpl/t_home.tpl Who might I talk with? Regards, Critt Critt Jarvis Wilmington, North Carolina / Boston, Massachussetts www.critt.com ----- Original Message ----- From: "Evan D Ravitz" To: Sent: Tuesday, March 06, 2001 6:24 AM Subject: [cea-usa] The Direct Democracy Amendment and Act I noticed that the poll "who is President of the USA" shows that "Everyone" beat out even Woody Harrelson! In this democratic spirit (trumping the star system) I offer this, the most ambitious and practical attempt to improve government since the Constitution: ******* You take responsibility for your own life. Now we can take responsibility for where our taxes -and our nation- go: The Direct Democracy Amendment will allow citizens to propose and vote directly for the laws we want, to complement --to "check and balance"-- our representatives at all levels of government from local to Federal. It will make this process easier, more deliberative, and less influenced by money than "initiative" laws which currently exist in 24 States. It will empower people. The Direct Democracy Amendment is the product of 10 years of research and litigation by the national nonprofit Philadelphia II, which is led by US Senator Mike Gravel (Democrat, Alaska, 1969-81) who singlehandedly filibustered the draft to its end, released the Pentagon Papers (thus getting Daniel Ellsburg off the hook), and was first to oppose nuclear power, among other acts of courage. State initiatives have already provided the models for many national laws we take for granted, from the abolition of poll taxes and aid to dependent children to direct election of Senators and direct primaries to women's suffrage and workman's compensation. You can see the entire historical record on the web at Vote.org. Pollster George Gallup, Sr. said of us: "On most major issues we've dealt with in the past 50 years, the public was more likely to be right -based on the judgment of history- than the legislatures or Congress." Fortunately, we DON'T have to beg Congress to amend this to the Constitution! The first words of the Constitution make it clear who's in charge here: "We the People.do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." The Declaration of Independence says we may "alter or abolish" our government. The Direct Democracy Amendment would alter the Constitution in the most significant way since it was established -at Philadelphia "I". The Constitution itself was ratified NOT by the existing Colonial legislatures, but by constitutional conventions composed of citizens. The mechanism we have devised to "ratify" the Direct Democracy Amendment is for Philadelphia II to conduct a vote for all U.S.-registered voters. We intent to collect enough 'YES' votes (with names & addresses for verification) to exceed half those who voted in the 2000 presidential election. Congress might fight it in Court, but the best Constitutional experts say we will win because of the First Principles cited above. First Principles were described by James Madison, chief writer of the Constitution, as the right of the people to "just do it." We invite you to join our discussion or contribute to the educational, tax-deductible educational arm of Philadelphia II, called Direct Democracy. Just go to Vote.org. 4 Myths about initiatives and direct democracy: 1. "Money has bought the initiative process." This myth was boosted by Washington's leading pundit David Broder in his 2000 book Democracy Derailed and his Washington Post editorial syndicated countrywide. His purely anecdotal evidence is contradicted by Elizabeth Gerber's thorough study of 31 California initiatives, available from the Public Policy Institute of California at: http://www.ppic.org/publications/ PPIC115/pp.rb115.html. She also studied 161 initiatives from 8 states for her book The Populist Paradox: Interest Group Influence and the Promise of Direct Legislation, with similar conclusions. 2. "Direct democracy means instant, emotional voting." The Direct Democracy Amendment would NOT allow instant voting after a TV debate, as Ross Perot favored in 1992. In Switzerland, where citizens have made national and local laws for over 150 years, laws must be debated for 36 months before a vote; Constitutional Amendments for 50 months. This is FAR more deliberative than anything representatives do! We the People should decide how long things must be considered before a vote. 3. "Direct democracy means everyone voting on everything." Hardly! We intend to leave the existing legislative bodies as is, merely adding citizen law-making. How easy should it be for citizens to get laws on the ballot? The citizens should decide! To get started, the Direct Democracy Amendment adds one method easier than the petitioning required for State and local initiatives: if a legitimate poll shows over 50% of people want to vote on an initiative, they get to do so. 4. "Direct democracy means tyranny of the majority." We also want to leave as is the judicial system which has struck down the worst citizen initiatives --Colorado's 1992 Amendment 2 which the courts said discriminated against gays, and California's Proposition 187, which discriminated against immigrants. It is really "tyranny of the minority" -Congress- which we should be afraid of: Congress conducted the "McCarthy Committee" persecutions in the '50s and '60s, and they STILL conduct the Drug War. Both, like Amendment 2 and Proposition 187 blatantly violate the "equal protection" clause of the 14th Amendment. But, in these and other cases, the courts didn't stop Congress' tyranny as they stopped unconstitutional citizen initiatives. Campaign finance reform is almost always accomplished by citizen initiatives, not by politicians. When politicians do it, they always leave loopholes. We DID have campaign finance reform after Watergate, but money has found new ways into the pockets of politicians. The Direct Democracy Amendment makes government more reformable. WHATEVER reforms you favor, your fellow citizens are more likely to vote for them than almost all politicians. People as varied as the editors of The Economist Magazine (see the 14 articles at vote.org/econ.htm ) and the Zapatista rebels in Mexico think that direct democracy is the future. Much more information is at Vote.org. Evan Ravitz, Vote.org founder, and Philadelphia II Board of Advisors member Voted "Best Activist" by Boulder Daily Camera readers -------------------- deleted yahoo group (via google cache): category: Drugs and Medications A support group for people who have recently received a doctor's diagnosis of a condition Medical Marijuana has been known to help and are seeking more information -- Or for those whose families have been victimized by the "War on SOME Drugs" through raid, arrest or harrassment for marijuana, or other choices concerning one's own private, personal or medical preferences. For our purposes, a "CompassionateMom" is gender neutral. Anyone who cares for or loves another person qualifies. CompassionateMoms, like angels, come in many forms. Our mission, in emulation of the Native American grandmothers, is to preserve and protect the life and welfare of the earth, and all who live upon it by utilizing the gentlest medicines for the body and most protective medicines for the environment. We seek alternatives to harsh synthetic chemicals, depletion of our limited natural resouces, and to avert the harm being done to ourselves and our planet by the resulting pollutants. We advocate Harm Reduction, not oppression. Honesty and candor over lies and propaganda. Real life experience over carefully packaged hype. Love, compassion and support over punishment, estrangement or authoritarianism. This is a discussion list. Don't be shy, Jump right in.. ---------------------- is nothing but independence from any obligation to reason and act according to some law independent of such authorities. Skepticism is a form of hysterical blindness to the fact of one's own credulous grovelling. One cannot systematically know the pathology of most Left groups and "independent radicals" except from this analytical standpoint. In the "workerist" versions of this, the group focuses on propitiating the prevailing prejudices of militant workers. Such groups villify, as either "idealism" or "elitism," the notion that there exists some immediate self-interest for workers which is either independent of or opposite to (not merely an extrapolation of) the prevailing prejudices of militant trade-union "rank-and-filers." Hence, they reject Kepler's outlook, that the interests of (workers as) the whole and therefore the actual interests of the individual (worker), are governed by some underlying rational principle which can be known only by rising above the heteronomic conceits of self-interest of (worker) monads. This is reflected in the fact that most of such Left groups can be, in one instance trade-union chauvinists (when they are attempting to propitiate trade-union "militant rank-and-filers"), and in another instance union-busters and job-busters (when they are propitiating the adduced narrow prejudices of unorganized oppressed and unemployed workers). They are incapable of discerning the common class-interest which is lawfully common to both groupings and which is thus in opposition to the pathetic heteronomic immediate impulses of each. The anti-theoretical attitudes, or "healthy skepticism" toward theoretical determination of necessary policies, must be understood not as a point of view, but as a lawful reflection of bourgeois ideology. The form of "academic" debates within the Left reveals the same "schlimihl syndrome." Choosing idealized authority (Lenin, or Mao Tse Tung, et al.), the Left group argues its point of view in terms of canonical glosses on canonical literary extractions or canonical interpretations of practice of these "authorities." Obviously, here the question of lawfully demonstrating a principle is brushed aside in favor of the academic norm of seeking "a passing grade for recitations." Or, among "independent Leftists," we see the refusal to commit themselves firmly to any policy but that of the "need to have rational discussion among the various points of view." As soon as any one discussion is apparently "settled" even in this miserable fashion, the "independent Leftist" dredges up notice of some other alternative, which has to be discussed in its own terms, before commitment can be entertained. The differentiation between the two such tendencies (so-called "Marxist-Leninist" "hards," and "independents) is real, but still demonstrates the common quality within which those differentiations are subsumed. The "hard" has chosen to act in a certain way, and resorts to the same sort of skeptics' rationalization of strong personal impulses ("constituency" | rights of heteronomic impulses) as the "independent," who uses the same skepticism as the inexhaustible basis for rationalizing moral indifferentism toward any definite Left commitment. The "independent" is only the more immediately obvious symptom of the quality shared by both. The "independent," by rejecting any identity-commitment, poses the question of whether he is able to act on anything at all in life. Almost invariably, we do find him committed to something: the pursuit of individual, personal gratification of himself as a "little me," according to the dictates of his persona. This shows more obviously what is nonetheless obviously the case for deeper inquiry into the "hard." Neither accepts the existence of any deeper, fundamental body of lawful determination. Both are schlimihls, exploiting pathetic skepticism to distance themselves from obligations to any law but that of the universe of heteronomic little egos. Both reject the Spinozan notion of the individual's obligation to Freedom/Necessity, in favor of a moral rule agreeable to a world of monad-selves each fundamentally regulated by pursuit of autonomous impulses. Both the "hard" and the "independent" reflect this in the opposite ways they interpret the conflict between world-historical undertakings and the contrary right of the individual for "meaningful personal life" qua heteronomic individual life. The "Why?" of actually healthy childhood skepticism to which we refer in the text is not the sort of pathetic skepticism we have described in this extended footnote so far. The "Why?" of actually healthy childhood skepticism is a Keplerian "Why?", preoccupied with the search for fundamental laws, independent of the opinion of any particular other authorities per se. It seeks the universal which properly regulates the judgment and practice of both himself and those others. This actually healthy skepticism does not specify rejection of all external institutional authority. Rather, it limits its submission to external authority to that authority which has demonstrably shown itself to reflect systematic deliberations respecting fundamental law. It submits conditionally only to what it properly judges to be external scientific authority of that sort. Ironically, it is just that sort of external scientific authority which pathetic skepticism rejects. Pathetic skepticism counterposes the universal external law of heteronomy (empiricism, pragmatism, existential views) to the authority of systematic comprehension of universality. It rejects the approach from the standpoint of fundamentals (universal principles) in favor of the authority of aggregations.of particular heteronomic opinion and isolated experiences. ----------------- >>>>> here is the section before that making reference to the person Karl Kraus disliked so fervently: Heinrich Heine: Love The primary feeling-state is love, the affective content and form of recall of the creative process itself, the invariant human quality of the mind. To understand the dynamics of love, one begins by inquiring as to what practical expression can be given to the direct calling forth of the universal for all particular expressions of social creative activity. Every detail dissolves; the mind is dissolved into pure creative ferment, the universality of the creative act. What, then? We have emphasized that thought is the demand for an act. The omission of the act for the thought is a denial of the reflected benefit of the act for the identity, and correspondingly a dimunition of the identity. The force (emotion) of the thought would therefore seem to be in direct proportion to the force of reaction against the sense of identity (anxiety) experienced by frustration of the act. Experience substantiates such an hypothesis. Furthermore, it is demanded that the act must be in proportion to the force of the thought. Then, what is the act corresponding to the "pure emotion" of love? What, but the intensely sensuous concretized celebration of creative sociality in general? The mood must seize upon a concrete individual as its object. Either a concrete universalizing (social) creative act — as a great work of art, or sensuous loving of a concrete (universal) person. The poet Heine has the greatest clinical interest as a creative artist for this facet of the inquiry. A few preliminary contextual qualifications: If we use the term, "Romantic," to identify the tragic outcome of the great creative potential in a Robert Schumann, or the tragic limitations of the magnificently gifted Hugo Wolf, then Heine does not become a Romantic until his last wretched years of despondency. In form, Romantic art expresses the tragic interplay of Apollonian and Dionysian moods in the poets and musicians, especially, who are best identified with that movement. Wolf efficiently expresses the kernel of the tragedy at (this would please Hegel!) the point the Romantic period in art had been essentially completed. Wolf's pathology is efficiently isolated for clinical study by his setting of three Goethe poems, "Ganymed," "Grenzen der Menschheit," and "Prometheus." In the first two, Wolf's setting is definitive representation of the poem. In the third, excepting some brilliant passages (second, third, last segment of fourth, and fifth stanzas), Wolf fails to comprehend the essential conception brilliantly situated as the subject of the Goethe poem itself; as a setting of that poem, the ironic theme of Wolf's composition leads to a brilliantly executed artistic failure. This failure is not an incidental lapse, but the outcome of a systematic flaw which Wolf shares with the world-spirit of the Romantic period. The subject-matter (world-outlook) of the three Goethe poems gives the evidence required. "Ganymed" is the almost pure Apollonian mood, "Grenzen der Menschheit" a conflict between the Apollonian (fixed laws beyond alteration by man) and restive Dionysian (heteronomic) submission to that condition. Both moods Wolf captures perfectly, expressing thus the best powers encountered in the Romantics generally. The "Prometheus" reflects Goethe's genius in adducing the world-outlook of his own most revolutionary period of life, with a marked resemblance to Marx's "Theses On Feuerbach" — in contrast to Goethe's preoccupation of his philistine moods, fixed "Iron Laws." Wolf, perhaps the most fertile creative talent of the late Romantic ferment, shares the tragic flaw of that current, that he can comprehend only the Apollonian and Dionysian moods, and reflect the struggle between the two within himself. His creative potential is aborted at the point of solving that antinomy; he can not resolve the Dionysian-Apollonian contradiction in a Promethean Gestalt. Prometheus, for him, can attain only to anarchist's insolence, not all-conquering hubris. These three moods are affective (active) forms of what are otherwise three distinct epistemological world-outlooks. The Apollonian mood corresponds to naive "respect for law," the hysterical state of false-positiveness within general negation-of-the-negation determinations. The Dionysian mood is heteronomy unhinged. As its extreme expression, fascist movements, exhibits the point, the Dionysian tends toward the blind assertion of individual pathological freedom (i.e., hysterical existentialist "Libertarianism"), in insolent defiance of what anarchism otherwise slyly acknowledges to be the unchangeable "Iron Laws" of fixed Necessity. The Dionysian can not conceive of creating a positive new Necessity to conquer the old; he can conceive only of sly or exhibitionist smashing of a few artifacts of what remain for him unchangeable laws. The Dionysian (variously, fascist, anarchist, or "Third Camper") is entirely the subject of bourgeois ideology in every turn of his logic, his epistemology; his rebellion is limited to exhibitionist acts of pathetic insolence against the mere tokens, predicates of what he otherwise accepts as an unchangeable order of things. The Promethean mood, best epitomized by Beethoven in art, is that of our general thesis. Heine is located effectively and epistemologically on the last upsurge of the French Enlightenment, standing in outlook and reflective consciousness alike between Kant and Hegel.(7) Artistically he belongs to the same species of German culture's advancement of the French Enlightenment as Goethe, Beethoven and Hegel, adding to this the critical element of relative genius which is relatively the persisting phenomenon of the creative intellect among assimilated Jews.* Beethoven is the peak dividing the ascent from decline in art throughout the history of capitalist development. Heine belongs to what is still the ascent phase; after Beethoven, there is generally decline, for which the Romantic artistic movement is the opening and less degenerate form. * If we understand Marx on "The Jewish Question," we understand Spinoza, Marx, Heine, and other lesser figures the Enlightenment influence produced among such a disproportionate incidence of creative Jewish intellects. The Jew, whose medieval cultural identity adaptively reifies itself to the universalizing tendency in capitalist development, can cease to be a pariah (a Jew) either by becoming an ultra-nationalist chauvinist (e.g., the pathetic, hysterical French chauvinism of Emile Durkheim, or of Zionism) or becoming a revolutionary, an expression of world-historical man (e.g., Spinoza, Heine, Marx).( 12a) The Romantic artist's notion of love converges upon the love of the love-object as an object of heteronomical social relationships. His fixation converges increasingly upon the banal. Romantic art's conception of love tends to become degraded to the apotheosis of banalized bourgeois love. In Heine, love is a world-historical act. This notion is underlined by such ironical devices as the interdependency of the poet's love for the beloved person, the beloved place, and the beloved upsurge in human potential through which emergent development the poet, the beloved person, the beloved place, and the beloved human potential of peoples are unified. For Heine, the tragic element of the act of loving the person, the place, the peoples, is that each in its immediate "here" and now" are mere alienated predicates of the process of self-perfection, which can not be gigantic enough as such predicates to contain the infinite scope of his love (creativity, self-perfecting self-movement). Reflect for a moment on the tragedy of the creative poet's search for a beloved person (his concrete universal). He encounters in capitalist culture a banalized woman who portends momentarily all those qualities of humanity which might reflect (potentially) his own creative self-activity (as the rights and privileges of his thus beloved identity), a woman whose creative activity he could not only arouse but reflect. He is overwhelmed, thus, by the potential act of love, the sensuous thought of creating loving. The act of loving touches the woman, who reflects nothing of the poet's inner identity. She is a banalized, bourgeois woman, in whom creative processes lie inert, unwakeable. The poet desperately wills to arouse her creative inner self with the sheer force of his creative outpourings, but she remains dead, inert. The idea of a concrete-universal love-relationship for him so becomes a facet of his eternal migration in search of the "land that speaks my own language." It is a land of Life, of Springtime (Life born), and the awakening of great peoples. Yet, eternally, that desired place remains perpetually what the haunting voice within says, to be always where he cannot be. Florestan's mate, Fidelio, the Claerchen of "Egmont," revolutionary (creative) woman, does not yet exist for him. This notion of tragic artist's love is absolutely in opposition to the maudlin banalities of the Romantic period. The creative poet does not will to die for lack of such a love; he is perversely strengthened by the fact that the land of the philistines has no Delilah who can seduce him, banalize him. His tragedy is turned into a positive force; he becomes a revolutionary against all extant "Iron Laws," either a revolutionary per se or a revolutionary as all creative artists are revolutionaries. This poet's tragedy is elaborated constantly in the life of every adolescent and adult. The positive (creative) impulse in each individual, as this is more or less more conspicuous in virtually all children, seeks a social identity for itself as the inner self through love-relationships in which other persons become the concrete universal — the person who echoes the creative impulses of the loving one, the person whose creative impulses are reflected in oneself. Yet, in capitalist culture (in particular), the social identity, including that employed in mate-selection, is that of the persona. This persona is developed to establish the individual's value as an object in a world of fixed relationships, and thus locates the identity (persona-identity) in that which denies the existence of the creative impulses. The suppressed and repression-deformed creative impulse, a poor Caliban of a secret self, seeks realization of its deformed self, which is secured in a pathetic fashion by a surrogate for a concrete universal, a mating relationship premised on the bargaining of persona-qualities. Certain persona qualities in the opposite sex are made ideals for the alienated individual, the apparent qualities of physical appearance and "personality" (persona) which it is desirable to possess in another. Instead of actual love of the sort sung by Heine, selecting a concrete universal, the object-images of these "secondary characteristics" become "triggers" of a weak feeling of a stultified love "feeling-state" through cathexis relationships. (One's "it," the monad, is only implicitly loved "for itself.") Nonetheless, despite the fraudulent form and content of the prevailing paired relationships of this culture (in particular), this pairing, especially pre-climactic phases of the sexual act, becomes the closest approximation of a human relationship (love of the "inner self") which occurs generally in capitalist social relations, just because this pathetic mechanism does evoke a weak and pathological form of the generally suppressed human qualities of the individual. At the same time, for both better and worse, the mate does function as a surrogate for an actual concrete universal. A concretized sense of personal identity is supplied through the Gestalt of rights and privileges represented by the mate's love, and by making the sense of identity dependent upon the terms of perpetuation of that love. Love, the instrument for fostering creativity is deformed into an instrument for suppressing and even destroying creative impulses! This is most viciously developed in this culture respecting women. The woman is accultured to be a repository of banality (anti-intellectual, at least antagonistic toward the creative aspect of creative life). Even women of marked creative potentialities exhibit this in the anti-intellectual form of "feeling insights," "intuition." The woman is banalized by her principal oppressor, her mother, and becomes in the paired relationship as well as in the adolescent and adult mating process a catalyst and policeman of the bourgeois cult of banality. These connections of love and paired relationships to the creative processes in general are of the utmost importance for socialist groupings. Any toleration of the mythos of the woman as a creature of "feeling," in its "cultural relativist" forms of advocacy of "women's liberation" as well as the "chauvinist" practices, not only destroys the human potential of women in the movement, but has almost equally destructive reflected consequences for the men. Similarly, the cult of "sexual liberation," which imagined itself to be a revolt against the "bourgeois hang-up" of paired relationships, is absolutely guaranteed to destroy the intellectual powers of both the men and women who submit to such pathological "freedom." Love, as the expression and complement of creative mentation, is not an isolated act, but a process of development; for the period of its duration, the love-relationship must be a "permanent (infinite) form" of paired mating — otherwise the mental powers of both participants will be qualitatively impaired by the relationship. The specious argument against this is that sexual union with a number of people, as replacement for the paired relationship, does nothing but overcome the "hang-up" against following-through on one's love for "one's comrade," etc. The fallacy in this is that the love one extends to most people has the form of a predicate of a universal love for a class, etc. The quality of love appropriate to a paired love relationship among creative (e.g., revolutionary) individuals, is the universal act, in which all the predicates "dissolve" into their corresponding universality. The sexual act (or, a developing process of sexual acts as the sensuous distinction of a love-relationship) is uniquely the act which corresponds to that universal feeling of creativity. The loving in the particular relationship to others already has its appropriate, necessary sensuous realization in the predicated particular act; to introduce sexual acts into this sort of predicated particular relationship is to introduce an act which nothing in healthy mental life demands, and which could therefore contribute nothing to a healthy mental life. However, it is obvious whence arises this argument in defense of casually loving "one's comrade" sexually. This is nothing but the pornographic "sexual liberation" otherwise seen in the "sexual delicatessen" practices of the happily-defunct Weatherman SDS cult. This is nothing but a rationalization for the "community of women," the pathological bourgeois impulse so aptly discredited by Marx in his 1844 Manuscripts. Indeed, it cannot be considered accidental that the socialists of otherwise demonstrable creative potentials lose those creative capacities during the period they are committed to "liberated" sexual behavioral outlooks, and that these powers can be rather readily reestablished once the individual liberates himself, through appropriate self-examination, from the bourgeois ideological fetish of "sexual freedom." Because of the importance of the sense of identity in the dynamics of creative mentation, it is urgent that the socialist (individuals and group) insist on the best standard of paired mating-relationships. Specifically, there must be a sharing of mutual struggle to realize identity for one's creative powers, which as an array of predicates of particular creative activity, demand the corresponding Gestalt of universal creativity. The healthy internal life and outward functioning of a socialist group demands a socialist standard of paired relationships, in which the sense of identities involved is premised on the mutual struggle to realize the creative potentialities in oneself and the other, not as a pedagogical relationship of teacher to pupil, but as a relationship in which each is drawing upon the creative ferment in the other and realizing himself or herself in stimulating and receiving that ferment in the other. =------------------= The Unusual Radiations Produced by Nikola Tesla (c) Robert Neil Boyd "Secrets of Cold War Technology", a book by Gerry Vassilatos OVERVIEW: "The sudden quick closure of the switch now brought a penetrating shockwave throughout the laboratory, one which could be felt both as a sharp pressure and a penetrating electrical irritation. A "sting". Face and hands were especially sensitive to the explosive shockwaves, which also produced a curious "stinging" effect at close range... "Tesla shielded himself with several materials. The arrangement of rapidly interrupted high voltage direct currents resulted in the radiation of stinging rays which could be felt at great distances from their super-sparking source. In fact, Tesla felt the stings right through the shields! Whatever had been released from the wires during the instant of switch closure, successfully penetrated the shields of glass and of copper. It made no difference, the effect permeated each substance as if the shield were not there at all... "Through successive experimental arrangements, Tesla discovered several facts concerning the production of his effect. First, the cause was undoubtedly found in the abruptness of charging. It was in the switch closure, the very instant of "closure and break", which thrust the effect out into space. The effect was definitely related to time, IMPULSE time. Second, Tesla found that it was imperative that the charging process occurred in a single impulse. No reversal of current was permissible, else the effect would not manifest... "The effect could also be greatly intensified to new and more powerful levels by raising the voltage, quickening the switch "make-break" rate, and shortening the actual time of switch closure... He found this "automatic switch" in special electrical arc dischargers. The high voltage output of a DC generator was applied to twin conductors through his new arc mechanism, a very powerful permanent magnet sitting crosswise to the discharge path. The discharge arc was automatically and continually "blown out" by this magnetic field... "By properly adjusting the inherent circuit parameters, Tesla learned how to produce an extremely rapid series of unidirectional impulses on demand. When the impulses were short, abrupt, and precise in their successions, Tesla found that the shocking effect could permeate very large volumes of space with apparently no loss of intensity. He also found that the shocking effect penetrated sizable metal shields and most insulators with ease. Developing a means for controlling the number of impulses per second, as well as the intermittent time intervals between each successive impulse, he began discovering a new realm of effects. Each impulse duration gave its own peculiar effects. Able to feel the stinging shocks, though shielded at a distance of nearly fifty feet from his apparatus... "Controlling the rapidity of current blowout in the magnetic DC arc, Tesla released a new spectrum of light-like energies throughout his large gallery space. These energetic species were like no other which the world has since seen. Tesla found that impulse duration alone defined the effect of each succinct spectrum. These effects were completely distinctive, endowed with strange additional qualities never purely experienced in Nature..." FURTHER DETAIL: TESLA RADIANT ENERGY: SHOCKWAVES "... while endeavoring toward his own means for identifying electrical waves, Tesla was blessed with an accidental observation which forever changed the course of his experimental investigations. Indeed, it was an accident which forever changed the course of his life and destiny. In his own attempts to achieve where he felt Hertz had failed, Tesla developed a powerful method by which he hoped to generate and detect real electromagnetic waves. Part of this apparatus required the implementation of a very powerful capacitor bank. This capacitor "battery" was charged to very high voltages, and subsequently discharged through short copper bus-bars. The explosive bursts thus obtained produced several coincident phenomena which deeply impressed Tesla, far exceeding the power of any electrical display he had ever seen. These proved to hold an essential secret which he was determined to uncover. The abrupt sparks, which he termed "disruptive discharges", were found capable of exploding wires into vapor. They propelled very sharp shockwaves, which struck him with great force across the whole front of his body. Of this surprising physical effect, Tesla was exceedingly intrigued. Rather like gunshots of extraordinary power than electrical sparks, Tesla was completely absorbed in this new study. Electrical impulses produced effects commonly associated only with lightning. The explosive effects reminded him of similar occurrences observed with high voltage DC generators. A familiar experience among workers and engineers, the simple closing of a switch on a high voltage dynamo often brought a stinging shock, the assumed result of residual static charging. This hazardous condition only occurred with the sudden application of high voltage DC. This crown of deadly static charge stood straight out of highly electrified conductors, often seeking ground paths which included workmen and switchboard operators. In long cables, this instantaneous charge effect produced a hedge of bluish needles, pointing straight away from the line into the surrounding space. The hazardous condition appeared briefly, at the very instant of switch closure. The bluish sparking crown vanished a few milliseconds later, along with the life of any unfortunate who happened to have been so "struck". After the brief effect passed, systems behaved as designed. Such phenomena vanished as charges slowly saturated the lines and systems. After this brief surge, currents flowed smoothly and evenly as designed. The effect was a nuisance in small systems. But in large regional power systems where voltages were excessive, it proved deadly. Men were killed by the effect, which spread its deadly electrostatic crown of sparks throughout component systems. Though generators were rated at a few thousand volts, such mysterious surges represented hundreds of thousands, even millions of volts. The problem was eliminated through the use of highly insulated, heavily grounded relay switches. Former engineering studies considered only those features of power systems which accommodated the steady state supply and consumption of power. It seemed as though large systems required both surge and normal operative design considerations. Accommodating the dangerous initial "supercharge" was a new feature. This engineering study became the prime focus of power companies for years afterward, safety devices and surge protectors being the subject of a great many patents and texts. Tesla knew that the strange supercharging effect was only observed at the very instant in which dynamos were applied to wire lines, just as in his explosive capacitor discharges. Though the two instances were completely different, they both produced the very same effects. The instantaneous surge supplied by dynamos briefly appeared super-concentrated in long lines. Tesla calculated that this electrostatic concentration was several orders in magnitude greater than any voltage which the dynamo could supply. The actual supply was somehow being amplified or transformed. But how?... The high voltage of the dynamo exerted such an intense unidirectional pressure on the densified charges that alternations were impossible. The only possible backrushes were oscillations. In this case, charges surged and stopped in a long series until the supercharge was wasted away. All parameters which forced such oscillations actually limited the supercharge from manifesting its total energetic supply, a condition Tesla strove to eliminate. Indeed he spent an excessive time developing various means to block every "backrush" and other complex current echo which might forced the supercharge to prematurely waste its dense energy. Here was an effect demanding a single unidirectional super pulse. With both the oscillations and alternations eliminated, new and strange effects began making their appearance. These powerful and penetrating phenomena were never observed when working with high frequency alternations... The sudden quick closure of the switch now brought a penetrating shockwave throughout the laboratory, one which could be felt both as a sharp pressure and a penetrating electrical irritation. A "sting". Face and hands were especially sensitive to the explosive shockwaves, which also produced a curious "stinging" effect at close range. Tesla believed that material particles approaching the vapor state were literally thrust out of the wires in all directions. In order to better study these effects, he poised himself behind a glass shield and resumed the study. Despite the shield, both shockwaves and stinging effects were felt by the now mystified Tesla. This anomaly provoked a curiosity of the very deepest kind, for such a thing was never before observed. More powerful and penetrating than the mere electrostatic charging of metals, this phenomenon literally propelled high voltage charge out into the surrounding space where it was felt as a stinging sensation. The stings lasting for a small fraction of a second, the instant of switch closure. But Tesla believed that these strange effects were a simple effect of ionized shockwaves in the air, rather like a strongly ionized thunderclap. Tesla devised a new series of experiments to measure the shockwave pressure from a greater distance. He required an automatic "trip switch". With this properly arranged, a more controlled and repetitious triggering of the effect was possible. In addition, this arrangement permitted distant observations which might cast more light on the shield-permeating phenomenon. Controlling the speed of the high voltage dynamo controlled the voltage. With these components properly adjusted, Tesla was able to walk around his large gallery spaces and make observations. Wishing also to avoid the continuous pressure barrage and its stinging sparks, Tesla shielded himself with several materials. The arrangement of rapidly interrupted high voltage direct currents resulted in the radiation of stinging rays which could be felt at great distances from their super-sparking source. In fact, Tesla felt the stings right through the shields! Whatever had been released from the wires during the instant of switch closure, successfully penetrated the shields of glass and of copper. It made no difference, the effect permeated each substance as if the shield were not there at all. Here was an electrical effect which communicated directly through space without material connections. Radiant electricity!... RADIANT ELECTRICITY Through successive experimental arrangements, Tesla discovered several facts concerning the production of his effect. First, the cause was undoubtedly found in the abruptness of charging. It was in the switch closure, the very instant of "closure and break", which thrust the effect out into space. The effect was definitely related to time, IMPULSE time. Second, Tesla found that it was imperative that the charging process occurred in a single impulse. No reversal of current was permissible, else the effect would not manifest. In this, Tesla made succinct remarks describing the role of capacity in the spark-radiative circuit. He found that the effect was powerfully strengthened by placing a capacitor between the disrupter and the dynamo. While providing a tremendous power to the effect, the dielectric of the capacitor also served to protect the dynamo windings. Not yet sure of the process at work in this phenomenon, Tesla sought the empirical understanding required for its amplification and utilization. He had already realized the significance of this unexpected effect The idea of bringing this strange and wondrous new phenomenon to its full potential already suggested thrilling new possibilities in his mind. He completely abandoned research and development of alternating current systems after this event, intimating that a new technology was about to unfold. The effect could also be greatly intensified to new and more powerful levels by raising the voltage, quickening the switch "make-break" rate, and shortening the actual time of switch closure. Thus far, Tesla employed rotating contact switches to produce his unidirectional impulses. When these mechanical impulse systems failed to achieve the greatest possible effects, Tesla sought a more "automatic" and powerful means. He found this "automatic switch" in special electrical arc dischargers. The high voltage output of a DC generator was applied to twin conductors through his new arc mechanism, a very powerful permanent magnet sitting crosswise to the discharge path. The discharge arc was automatically and continually "blown out" by this magnetic field... By properly adjusting the inherent circuit parameters, Tesla learned how to produce an extremely rapid series of unidirectional impulses on demand. When the impulses were short, abrupt, and precise in their successions, Tesla found that the shocking effect could permeate very large volumes of space with apparently no loss of intensity. He also found that the shocking effect penetrated sizable metal shields and most insulators with ease. Developing a means for controlling the number of impulses per second, as well as the intermittent time intervals between each successive impulse, he began discovering a new realm of effects. Each impulse duration gave its own peculiar effects. Able to feel the stinging shocks, though shielded at a distance of nearly fifty feet from his apparatus, Tesla recognized at once that a new potential for electrical power transmission had been revealed to him. Tesla was first to understand that electrical shock waves represented a new means for transforming the world... Tesla found it impossible to measure a diminution in radiant force at several hundred yards... Also, Tesla wished to determine the effect of gradually decreased impulse durations required greatest skill and precaution. Tesla knew that he would be exposing himself to mortal danger. Controlling the rapidity of current blowout in the magnetic DC arc, Tesla released a new spectrum of light-like energies throughout his large gallery space. These energetic species were like no other which the world has since seen. Tesla found that impulse duration alone defined the effect of each succinct spectrum. These effects were completely distinctive, endowed with strange additional qualities never purely experienced in Nature. Moreover, Tesla observed distinct color changes in the discharge space when each impulse range had been reached or crossed. Never before seen discharge colorations did not remain a mystery for long. Trains of impulses, each exceeding 0.1 millisecond duration, produced pain and mechanical pressures. In this radiant field, objects visibly vibrated and even moved as the force field drove them along. Thin wires, exposed to sudden bursts of the radiant field, exploded into vapor. Pain and physical movements ceased when impulses of 100 microseconds or less were produced. These latter features suggested weapon systems of frightful potentials. With impulses of 1.0 microsecond duration, strong physiological heat was sensed. Further decreases in impulse brought spontaneous illuminations capable of filling rooms and vacuum globes with white light At these impulse frequencies, Tesla was able to stimulate the appearance of effects which are normally admixed among the electromagnetic energies inherent in sunlight. Shorter impulses produced cool room penetrating breezes, with an accompanying uplift in mood and awareness. There were no limits in this progression toward impulses of diminished duration. None of these impulse energies could be duplicated through the use of high frequency harmonic alternations, those which Sir Oliver Lodge popularized, and which later was embodied in Marconi Wave Radio. Few could reproduce these effects because so few understood the absolute necessity of observing those parameters set by Tesla. These facts have been elucidated by Eric Dollard, who also successfully obtained the strange and distinct effects claimed by Tesla." Home Physics Spirit and Consciousness e.e. cummings Artwork Harmony Dynamics Penetrating Insight Health Miscellaneous rnboyd@mip.net 412 Resonance Frequencies (c) Robert Neil Boyd) Q: "How does one work out the resonance factor of a something to be "cured"? A: Depends what it is that we are trying to accomplish. For example, the 6-band resonance of bone is markedly different than the 6-band resonance of a virus. (6-band resonance is related to the frequency domains of objects of various sizes. For example, we can resonate with the large structure, a bone. Then we can resonate the constituent cells, as whole units, which create the bone. Next, we can resonate the internal structures of that cell, e.g. mitchondria, DNA, etc,. Then, going smaller, we can resonate the individual proteins of the DNA. Smaller, we can resonate with the atomic elements of those proteins. Even smaller, we can resonate the elementary particles which comprise the atomic elements. Ion Cyclotron Resonance and Nuclear Magnetic Resonance are commonly used in this domain. We can also resonate combinations of these various bands simultaneously.) Have you ever had any involvement with radio gear, such as antenna construction? When we want to transmit a radio signal of a particular frequency, we find that the strongest radiated signal occurs when the wavelength of the radio wave is precisely equal to the length of the antenna. (Typically, antennas one quarter of the frequency are used, even though they are not as efficient as a full wave antenna, they are efficient enough.) When we are building our antenna, we can instrument the power output through the antenna. When we reach the frequency of resonance, we observe a dramatic increase in the ERP (Effective Radiated Power). Making the antenna wire shorter or longer, will create a reduction in the ERP. The field of study known as harmonics is related here. In terms of music, we have the fundamental, the harmonic, the overtone, and the octave. These same factors are involved when studying any kind of resonance. In terms of off-the-shelf resonance detection instruments, a commonly used device is an instrument known as a spectrum analyser. This instrument registers the radio frequencies, for example, which are, for example, in the air, as visible lines on a CRT, rather in the manner of an oscilloscope. The high power at a given frequency will show on the screen as a vertical form, where the height of the form is directly related to the power density at that particular frequency at that particular time. The instrument measures the energy-density in the frequency over time domain. It is rather simple to apply to studies of linear E/M resonances. Things do get more complicated though, because stochastic and nonlinear resonances are possible, which can couple into linear systems, giving misleading results in the linear domain. Nonlinear resonances are one of the reasons that RF engineers design their circuits with a certain amount of "slop". In addition, we can have resonances in the complex and quaternionic domains (aka "imaginary domain") of E/M radiation. Detection of resonances in complex and quaternionic E/M systems requires specialized instruments. Anyway, the simplest answer to your question is, that we send energy in various forms, at various frequencies, into the system, then look for spikes indicating that resonance has occurred. -- RN Boyd ------------------------- THE INcredible Shrinking President by Alexander Cockburn Because it's thirty years since Watergate we've been treated to plenty of photos of Richard Nixon, mostly at the moment he was leaving office. I was among those happy to see him go, but today am sad that for obvious reasons the National Archive will never be in a position to release Nixon's unvarnished comments on the man whose father he made chairman of the Republican National Committee. How aghast that malign political genius would have been at the ignoramus occupying the Oval Office once fragrant with Dick's curses. What a falling off is there! From malediction to malapropism. I'm sure W's speech is less burdened by obscenity than that of the Navy vet and seasoned poker player, but this is the purity of the born-again imbecile. W. has the vocabulary of a 12-year old, though most 12-year olds have an infinitely stronger grasp of world affairs. Our spaniel press makes herculean efforts to pass over the fact in silence, but the fact is that George W. Bush is the laughing stock of the world, by dint of the obvious fact that his maximum level of competence was that of greeter at the ball park in Arlington, which as David Vest recently remarked on this site, is the only real job he ever had before he met Ken Lay. Nixon had policies, strategies. Bush has notes (often contradictory) from his staff, which he bears no sign of comprehending for longer than the brief moments in which he lurches his way through them in some public forum. Take the Middle East. Don't even go back to last year. Just take the last few weeks, in which Bush told Mubarak of his hopes for a Palestinian state, hopes that promptly vanished with the arrival of his next visitor, Ariel Sharon. How long can Secretary of State Colin Powell endure the humiliation of being dispatched on one ludicrous mission after another, even as press secretary Ari Fleischer, (a man who makes Nixon's Ron Ziegler look like George Washington) tells the press that Powell's statements are irrelevant as expressions of presidential policy. Edward Said puts it well in a recent column: "To say that he and his disheveled administration 'want' anything is to dignify a series of spurts, fits, starts, retractions, denunciations, totally contradictory statements, sterile missions by various officials of his administration, and about-faces, with the status of an over-all desire, which of course doesn't exist. Incoherent, except when it comes to the pressures and agendas of the Israeli lobby and the Christian Right whose spiritual head he now is, Bush's policy consists in reality of calls for Arafat to end terrorism, and (when he wants to placate the Arabs) for someone somewhere somehow to produce a Palestinian state and a big conference, and finally, for Israel to go on getting full and unconditional US support including most probably ending Arafat's career. Beyond that, US policy waits to be formulated, by someone, somewhere, somehow." Iraq? It was the acme of the axis of evil. Then it wasn't, because the Joint Chiefs said it would be tough to invade the place. Now we've got something billed as a new preemptive policy. What's new about it? Throughout the cold war America's strategic policy never set aside the possibility of a preemptive first strike against the foe. We're now told that the CIA (yes, the same agency that has just made the worst screw-up in its history) should try to kill Saddam, on the grounds that if he makes any move to avoid being killed by the CIA, that can be construed as aggression, meriting assassination. Never mind that the US has been trying to kill Saddam since 1991, tried to mount coups against through the first half of the 1990s, concluded that it was impossible and that the best thing to do was throw some money around to groups like the Iraqi National Accord. Never mind all that. Here we are in the wake of a terrorist attack on the US embassy in Karachi that killed eleven (another major intelligence failure, right?) and the Bush regime (until it decided to hang Ashcroft out to dry) tries to change the subject with mighty boasts about the capture of a Puerto Rican gangbanger who took an H-bomb blueprint off the internet, and with a "new" finding for the CIA to finish off Saddam. How about national security? Should Bush have fired the FBI's and the CIA's director long since, along with that lunatic Clarke, a White House terror commissar under both Clinton and Bush. Of course he should. Should he have appointed a commission to reorganize America's intelligence agencies? Of course. But here we are in June of 2002 and all we have is a proposal to create a new alphabet soup of agencies now bracing to spend the next decade battling over bureaucratic and budgetary. Last time Bush was in Europe, a German newspaper ran a headline on its front page announcing Bush's bold new vision. Then it left the rest of the page blank. The Europeans are a snotty, self-regarding bunch, but this time they're on the money. The leader of the World, free and unfree, simply isn't up to par. He's not qualified for the job. He never was. And that means big trouble ahead for the World, Free and Unfree. At least Nixon knew what he was doing, which is why the world was frightened by him. When it's not laughing at him the world is frightened of George W. Bush because it knows he hasn't a clue. That's truly terrifying. --------------- counterpunch presents: Karl Kraus!!!! A Minor Detail by Karl Kraus [Editors' Note: Karl Kraus (1874-1936) was a Viennese satirist, famed but mostly inaccessible to those unacquainted with the German language. There are translations, including Dicta and Contradicta, translated by Jonathon McVity, and a collection put together by Harry Zohn and published under the title In These Great Times by Carcanet (NY) in 1985. Here's a squib Kraus wrote in 1915.] Wanted: a father-in-law to go into the women's war business with me. Am 33 years old and well known as a women's wear salesman. No matchm: Box 3378, Berlin S.W. I suppose "Cherchez la femme" no longer applies here. Go find mama, boy! Where is she? He doesn't speak of marrying into the business, because the father-in-law himself isn't in business yet. Normally such people at least said they wanted to find a business and were therefore looking for a wife. After all, they needed a living pretext. This is now eliminated; the father-in-law is the vestige of an obsolete stage of development which still had sentimentality and included a wife in the inventory. That's over with. Wanted: a father-in-law. The daughter can be dead if she likes. If she is present at the wedding, fine; if not, that's all right too. He'll just take the father-in-law as his sleeping partner. This is an innovation in women's wear: wear without women. The glow of classical greatness suffuses our time. Where is the woman whom such a fate will befall, who will perhaps read this ad without knowing that in the final analysis it concerns her? Where does the woman's wear live? Where does this ready-made apparel of a woman live? Where is she, that I may implore her to go into hiding and kill herself sooner than become the cadaver of this hyena? Men are now dying accidental deaths; women will give birth because two men want to go into business. A heroic age is dawning. Do not mourn what has been. Come, O dawn! Two scoundrels will in these great times shake hands over the dead life of a girl. 'Die Nobensache' (1915) ------------------ o Longer an Authentic Voice of Dissent Christopher Hitchens: the Dishonorable Policeman of the Left by Scott Lucas The New Statesman It was a sudden, devastating attack. The perpetrator struck mercilessly, leaving no time for a considered response. When he had finished, the 'left' was in ruins. 'I have no hesitation in describing this mentality, carefully and without heat,' the author wrote heatedly, 'as soft on crime and soft on fascism. No political coalition is possible with such people and, I'm thankful to say, no political coalition with them is now necessary. It no longer matters what they think.' And, with that strike, we could rest assured that no dissent--no quibbling about military action against Afghanistan; no worries about the bypassing of the United Nations or the International Court of Justice; no concerns that the Israel-Palestine issue, the tensions in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Indonesia or the Philippines would remain even after Osama Bin Laden and Mullah Omar had been hunted down; no mention of the long-term expansion of American power for motives perhaps less noble than the 'war on terrorism'--would rise from the smouldering target of this invective. For the attacker was not Donald Rumsfeld but the self-proclaimed 'contrarian', the 'singularly insightful . . . critic of American policy and culture' (Reason magazine), the 'honorable man of the left' (Atlantic magazine), that 'authentic voice of dissent' (Observer), Christopher Hitchens. Hitchens's assault was masterful. He gave it non-partisan respectability by launching it across the Anglo-American political spectrum: the London Evening Standard on 19 September 2001; the Nation, almost the only semblance of a mainstream 'left' journal in the US, on 24 September; the Guardian and Spectator in the following three days. His past record--as vilifier of Pinochet's Chile and scourge of Bill Clinton's 'Monicagate', of air strikes against Iraq and the Sudan, and, above all, for tracking the 'war criminal' Henry Kissinger--established his claim to being the honourable policeman of the left, attacking it in order to save it. Since then, Hitchens has worked his beat masterfully. In addition to his periodic walkabouts in the Guardian, the Mirror and the Evening Standard, there has been the unveiling of his tome Letters to a Young Contrarian, an appearance on Start the Week, the references to his latest book-length mission, Orwell's Victory (in which he binds history to the present by exalting the 'decent Englishman' George and smiting evildoers such as Raymond Williams). There has even been time to inspire, with wit and wine, Lynn Barber's tribute in the Observer. Hitch has toned down the polemic and moved to other concerns--he's travelled through India and revisited his persistent target Kissinger--but still he lurks behind the forelock, ready to pounce if the bad lefties reassemble to suck up to Islam: 'I'm not surprised at criticism from the 'Ramadanistas' . . . I don't care what they think . . . It's one long bleat from these guys and gals.' But it ain't the final reel for our hero yet. Sheriff Hitchens rode into London on 15 May, saddling up for a debate on 'the war on terrorism', and found that all his carpet-bombing, daisy-cutting rhetoric hadn't wiped out the 'left'. On the podium, there was top schoolmarm Onora O'Neill, with her pragmatic approach to nation states and human rights, politely asking about the evidence to prove Hitchens's 'Islamic fascist' conspiracy (in which he characterises Islam as one homogenised entity, committed to imposing sharia law across the globe). There was Jacqueline Rose, the Freudian with the heart of gold, linking Hitchens's rhetoric to that of Tony Blair, Ariel Sharon and Osama Bin Laden: 'At best, two boys in a playground fighting, at worst two dead men talking . . . very exciting, very ineffectual, and very dangerous.' There was Anatole Lieven, too thoughtful by half. He reminded the Sheriff that he, Lieven, had supported a retaliatory strike against al-Qaeda, but then he became a pest with his depression because the US had not developed 'a new commitment to humanitarian principles and a new sense of international law and international institutions', and warned that a 'war on Islam' would never succeed. And there, at the other end of the table, was Tariq Ali. He tried to hide his menace behind his smile, he checked his black hat at the door, but we still knew that he was a quick-draw barb-slinger. He quipped about the 'thinker president' and labelled Hamid Karzai an 'old US agent'. And he warned that 'the effects of this business are by no means over', inconveniently noting the tenuous situation in Pakistan and the collective blind eye to Saudi support for al-Qaeda. The Sheriff was soon agitated, scribbling notes and scanning the audience, cheek in hand. He tested his learned one-liners against the villainous Ali--'I'll try to avoid casuistry as well as prolixity'; he tried his chastising one-liners--'I hope we've heard the last of the sneering at President Bush . We've certainly heard the first of it'; he fell back on his best 9/11 phrases--'civilian airliners turned into cruise missiles'. But, while it may have worked in Peoria, it wasn't going down well in London. Hitchens's opening shots met largely with a 'been there, heard that' response. Defensive, then desperate, he moved from target to target: how about fatwas from Iran? Sharia law in Nigeria? Synagogues burned in Tunisia? Synagogues burned and trashed in London? Immigrants bringing the rise of Jean-Marie Le Pen in France? Everywhere the 'destruction of society where only one book is allowed'? No joy. Only when the Sheriff mentioned the rightness of action in Kosovo were some of the citizenry moved. By contrast, Jacqueline Rose's comments on the dangers of warrior language were warmly received, and she was loudly commended when she took on Hitchens's free association that 'theocratic fascism' was even responsible for the Dreyfus affair: 'It was the French, not Islamic theocracy, that put Dreyfus on trial.' Hitchens snapped at the audience: 'You'll clap anything?' For the Sheriff, the evening had already turned into High Noon: he was taking on all of us. He lashed out: 'I won't bore you with that moral mushy stuff about airliners/ cruise missiles/terrified passengers , even if many of you have already forgotten it'--and encountered booing and heckling. (To its credit, the audience, as well as the moderator, immediately silenced the hecklers.) When he was booed for turning aside a question derisively, he redoubled the challenge to the audience: 'If you knew how you sound when you hissed, you wouldn't do it. You sound like such berks.' And, always, there was his sneer and mocking handclap when those listening responded to a point that was not his: 'Anyone can get more applause than me.' It had come to this. An elderly gentleman challenged the Sheriff over the dangers of US foreign policy. The Sheriff shot back wildly, 'I assume you are from the subcontinent,' and tried to finish off his assailant: 'I wouldn't expect you to think otherwise with your ideology.' The gentleman replied in agitation: 'I am not from the subcontinent.' Hitchens blustered, 'We can all make mistakes.' Off mike, he said: 'Well, he certainly looks like he's from the subcontinent.' It didn't have to be this way. In the first few days after 11 September, Hitchens was not attacking (except for George W Bush, 'a shadow framed by powerful advisers and handlers, a glove puppet with little volition of his own and a celebrated indifference to foreign affairs'): he was cautioning that 'the question Americans are asking is how--not why'. But then something happened. Maybe it was the horror and agony of losing a friend, the CNN commentator Barbara Olson, in the attacks. Maybe it was the surge of anger and mourning for the loss of a 'big, free, happy, carefree society'. Maybe it was just the pressure of writing quickly for newspapers clamouring for answers. Probably it was all of these. Hitchens had a little think for Americans, for all of us, and came up with an easy 'why' in the Evening Standard: The people who destroyed the World Trade Center, and used civilians as accessories, are not fighting to free Gaza. They are fighting for the right to throw acid in the faces of unveiled women in Kabul and Karachi. The petty-minded might have quibbled at the easy slippage from 'the people who destroyed the World Trade Center' to the unnamed 'they' who may have had nothing to do with the attack, who may even have condemned it, but who were undoubtedly scarring women and blowing up the Buddha. (He was not the only person to make this manoeuvre: Bush also pulled it off the following day in his speech to Congress, the one that put the Taliban, rather than Osama Bin Laden, in the US cross-hairs.) But Hitchens was already beyond such objections, beyond the need for any understanding of the complexities of the region, of Islam, of 'America'. The enemy was not just over there, he was here. Suitably buoyed by this discovery, he crushed his foes with a bombardment of invective: 'Liberal masochism is of no use to us at a time like this, and Muslim self-pity even less so. Self-preservation and self-respect make it necessary to recognise and name a lethal enemy when one sees one.' No link was too tenuous, no tone too shrill for our intrepid protector. Hitchens assured us that if 'brave American civilians' had not been allowed 'to mount a desperate resistance' on United Airlines Flight 93, which crashed in the Pennsylvania countryside, 'I would be looking out at a gutted Capitol or charred White House, and reading Pinter or Pilger on how my neighbourhood had been asking for it'. The assertion of Sam Husseini, the director of the US-based Institute for Public Accuracy, that al-Qaeda 'could not get volunteers to stuff envelopes if Israel had withdrawn from Jerusalem like it was supposed to--and the US stopped the sanctions and the bombing on Iraq', was not the 'why' that Hitchens wanted. So it became 'a simple refusal to admit that a painful event has occurred . . . a cheery rationalisation of something ghastly . . . a crude shifting of blame'. This was 'with us or against us' intellectual warfare, a 'ha ha ha to the pacifists', a warning to the moaning 'peaceniks' and any other Bin Ladens: 'There are more of us and we are both smarter and nicer, as well as surprisingly insistent that our culture demands respect, too.' This victory won, Hitchens's macho swagger has taken a knock recently. He was unsettled by his new bedfellows' 'axis of evil', 'the symbolic phrase for everything that has become risky and dubious and opportunistic about the new Bush foreign policy', even as he fell into confused hand-wringing about Iraq, where he could not wish away the problems of realpolitik with his moral wand--'in many ways, the United States quite likes the Saddam regime'. (C'mon, Christopher, no liberal whining!) And the silence on the Israeli-Palestinian imbroglio of the 'authentic voice of dissent', a prominent supporter of a Palestinian state and critic of Ariel Sharon, was finally broken on 15 April with a column for the new-look Mirror. But, after seeing Hitchens at the debate, organised by the London Review of Books, I fear these thoughtful moments will be rare. 'The Hitch' is no longer an activist, no longer a participant in the real debates about power and who wields it, no more a source for thought. No, he is an industry, posing in trench coat with a cigarette dangling from his top lip, hailed as 'one of the few remaining practitioners of the five-hour, two-bottle lunch'. And, naturally, the most profitable industry is a monopoly. So he packages himself, surreally, not just as a policeman but the only policeman of 'a radical left that no longer exists'. Just as Orwell eventually saw himself as Charles Dickens, 'a type hated with equal hatred by all the smelly little orthodoxies which are now contending for our souls', Hitchens now sees himself as Orwell (who, as the cover of Orwell's Victory reminds us, also dangled a cigarette from his top lip), the lone voice of decency among the ranks of a naive and/or nasty left. It's an effective tactic. Like Orwell, Hitchens has made himself the poster boy of 'principled opposition', even as he sides with the dominant powers in the US, by wielding a scatter-gun, 'common-sense' rhetoric that does not have to deal with troubling political or economic considerations. He need not worry about such details. Only he, in his words, has 'elementary morals'. All others, with their 'oppositional stance' (like Orwell's pacifists who were the accomplices of fascism, like his 'pansy' leftist writers), can cower with their al-Qaeda allies or whimper in the op-ed columns of the Guardian. I don't care when the hapless Andrew Sullivan of the Sunday Times, through columns repetitively void, or his preening website, thrashes against the 'left'. I read Mark Steyn's 'loud bloke in a pub' opinions in Conrad Black's newspaper from the same safe distance that I would keep from any loud bloke in a pub. But Hitchens, because of his past affiliations, the quality and persistence of much of his writing, and especially his cause celebre against Kissinger, has street cred. This is more than a semantic scrap, more than a sideshow to keep the intelligentsia gossiping. It is more than another contest between Christopher and Tariq for the soul of '68. We are well beyond 9/11, with the bodies piling up and human rights suspended in the West Bank; with detainees languishing uncharged not only in Camp X-Ray, but in American and British jails; with the United States desperate to unleash its bombers over Baghdad, to stare down Tehran, to crush insurgencies everywhere from Colombia to the Philippines, to topple governments that do not meet the 'with us or against us' criterion. In a 'war on terrorism' that is highly elastic, Hitchens's rhetoric of 'Islamic fascism' stretches conveniently. So, Sheriff, before you ride into the sunset, into Washington's sanctuary, I'm calling you out. Before you have another pop at the dissent of the 'left', do it fairly, where someone can respond with the political, economic, military and, yes, moral considerations that you might be shoving aside. If you are going to reduce your opposition to stick men and women, 'voluntary apologists for abuse of power' standing in the way of 'the model revolution of the American experiment', hang around for an answer before your five-hour lunch. Name the time, the place and the medium. This time, bring some evidence along with your one-liners. I'll be there. Scott Lucas is professor of American Studies at Birmingham University. He is working on a book about 11 September and the betrayal of dissent. This article originally appeared in The New Statesman. |