This bit of nonsense:

A formal answer might be that is is an ordered list of statements, ascending from an established fact (axiom, theorem, and so on) ...

found on the second page of an award winning
"exploration of human reasoning" invokes a "sigh."  An axiom is "A statement or proposition on which an Formal System is based" and doesn't - necessarily - have anything to do with "established fact."

Ever since I learnt about confirmation bias I've started seeing it everywhere

A snippet of her first stadium gig, and of course the entire audience was only on one side. But she was very happy.

You can't be me, I'm taken

Totally missed my 10-year high school reunion.  Could've been such epic lulz.

(sad panda)

Be nice to America. Or we'll bring democracy to your country.

real economics: The Boss takes on the banksters in Berlin

Bruce Springsteen lashes bankers during Berlin concertRocker taps into anger at financial world, dedicating anti-bank song to 'those who are struggling in Europe and Berlin'
Reuters in Berlin
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 31 May 2012

Bruce Springsteen has touched on a nerve of widespread discontent with financiers and bankers while performing a concert in Berlin.

Springsteen played to a sold-out crowd at Berlin's Olympiastadion, singing from his album Wrecking Ball and speaking about tough economic times that have put people out of work worldwide and led to debt crises in Greece and other countries.

"In America a lot of people have lost their jobs," said Springsteen, 62, who performed for three hours to 58,000 fans in the stadium that hosted the 1936 Olympics and 2006 World Cup final.

"But also in Europe and in Berlin, times are tough," he said, speaking in German. "This song is for all those who are struggling." He then introduced Jack of All Trades, a withering attack on bankers that includes the lyrics: "The banker man grows fat, working man grows thin."

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

Big Agriculture's Big Secrets: 9 Things You Need to Know About the Food You Eat | | AlterNet

7. Extreme Growth Promoters

Many of the growth promoters used in US meat production are banned in other countries. Europe boycotts US beef because of hormones like oestradiol-17 and trenbolone acetate which it says are linked to prostate and breast cancer. The EU also disallows farmers to use antibiotics and arsenic as growth promoters, which the US does. (Yes, arsenic.) Still, it is some consolation that most US growth promoters are withdrawn in the weeks before slaughter. Not so with ractopamine, an asthma-like drug given to 60 to 80 percent of US pigs, 30 percent of ration-fed cattle and an undisclosed number of turkeys. Ractopamine, which few are aware of, is given during the last weeks of life and not withdrawn before slaughter.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

real economics: Neoliberalism and the decline of Sweden's real economy

A Soviet submarine washed up on the shores of Sweden in the early 1980s, causing a considerable international incident. Olof Palme was again prime minister and he was busy trying to sort things out with the 'Big Bear'. Carl Bildt chose this time to travel to the US to discuss 'international politics' with the CIA. Palme wasn't happy about it.

The 'Russian submarine scares' began shortly afterward. The tabloids were full of double page spreads of murky photos of the Swedish archipelago where submarines (or perhaps Loch Ness monsters) could be seen as shady blotches. Carl Bildt repeatedly urged his country to take a tougher stand against Soviet aggression. 

Of course it later emerged that the whole thing was a 'frat boy' stunt by the CIA and NATO to shift Swedish public opinion out of legendary neutrality and into the arms of the US. The international arm of the US Republican Party had already made contact - Fredrick Reinfeldt was one of their 'future prospects'. 

Marriage & Power 

Carl Bildt married conservative party leader Bohman's daughter Mia in 1984 and took over party leadership two years later, the same year Olof Palme was assassinated. Carl Bildt was able to form a government of his own following the elections in 1991. 

Carl Bildt set about privatising the country, selling government interests, and initiating and completing the process whereby Sweden would join the EU. Carl Bildt also began the project to build the Öresund bridge between Sweden and Denmark. 

The social democrats again took power in 1994, but Carl Bildt was the one who signed Sweden's treaty for induction into the EU on Korfu 23 June, and shortly after became an EU 'mediator'. Bildt and friends again lost in the national elections of 1998, so he resigned his post as leader of the conservatives. 

Carl Bildt was appointed mediator by the UN for the wars in Yugoslavia in 1995, and on 14 December that same year became the first 'High Representative' for the office in Bosnia charged with carrying out the peace treaty. By 1999 he was Kofi Annan's special representative in the Balkans, and he continued in that role until 2001. 

But by then he was on the board of directors of Lundin Oil. 

Medals, Honours, More Power 

Carl Bildt can hold his own with the best of them - with the stuffy old apparatchiks who used to review troops from the Kremlin on international workers day. 

He's been a member of the Swedish Royal Academy of War Sciences since 1989. 

He's the recipient of the Belgian Order of the Crown, Estland's Pro Terra Mariana Cross, Finland's Order of the White Rose, Luxembourg's Order of the Oak Crown, the Norwegian Order of Service, the German Order of Service, grand officer of Latvia's Order of the Three Stars, admiral of Britain's Order of St Michael and St George, and is admiral of the French Honorary Legion. 

He received the Swedish king's medal of the 12th size (with chain) on 6 June 2003 with the motivation 'for truly outstanding political accomplishments', the second highest honour that can be bestowed on a Swedish citizen.

But it's Carl Bildt's reach and influence which are scary. Bildt is a board member for:

• Apen Italia (Rome)
• European Policy Centre (Bruxelles)
• Centre for European Reform (London)
• International Institute for Strategic Studies (London)
• Committee for the Liberation of Iraq (close ties with Bush administration)
• RAND Corporation (Arlington Country VA, Santa Monica) (1st ever outside US)
• Royal Swedish Academy of War Sciences

Bildt is also a member of:

• Bilderberg Group (since 2006)
• International Democrat Union (chairman 1992-1999)
• Trilateral Commission (founded by David Rockefeller)
• Council of Centre for the study of Terrorism and Political Violence
• Bildt also sat on the board of directors of the Russian investment company Vostok Nafta (based today in Bermuda) who control the Russian state gas company Gazprom. Bildt also was on the advisory committee of East Capital.
• Bildt's portfolio of stock in Vostok Nafta was reported to the Swedish parliament's constitutional committee. Bildt sold the stock two months later.

The Swedish general secretary for Amnesty International criticised Bildt's interests in Gazprom, but Bildt again avoided controversy by promising to divest all his interests in the corporation. more

There is a price to be paid for the neoliberal destruction of Sweden's real economy.  Last year they set a record for most emigrants.  And so we come full circle.  When I wonder why my grandparents left Sweden in the 19th century, the answer is pretty obvious.  Jackasses like Carl Bildt are probably the norm and folks like him made it very difficult for people like my forebears to even survive.

'Most Swedish emigrants ever in 2011'Published: 21 Feb 12
2011 marked the largest exodus from Sweden in history with over 50,000 people leaving the country, with China proving to be an ever more popular destination for Swedes who move abroad.
While Sweden added 67,285 people to its population last year, a record 51,179 people left the country, reported Statistics Sweden (Statistiska Centralbyrån -SCB

most excellent blog, with near zero commentary...

it is techno, isn't it?

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

Transit of Venus: Your last chance to see it before 2117 | The Raw Story

A small black dot will grace the face of the sun as it rises (over Europe) on Wednesday, when Venus makes a rare and historic journey across the burning disc of our parent star.

Few people alive today will have another chance to witness the transit of Venus, as the laws of orbital mechanics do not bring the planets into position again until December 2117.

In previous centuries, nations dispatched astronomers to their farthest territories to record the transit in progress. In doing so, they embarked on the first global scientific collaboration in history and answered the pressing question of the size of the solar system.

`They're robbing us': 12-year-old exposes Canada's banking flaws, goes viral | TruthTheory

Economists around the world are struggling to break free of the clutches of the financial crisis but a Canadian girl explains exactly what needs to be done.

Victoria Grant, 12, became an overnight Internet sensation after a video of her slamming Canada's banks and the government for robbing the people, went viral.

"What I've discovered is that banks and the government have colluded to financially enslave the people of Canada," she said at Pubic Banking Institute conference in Philadelphia.

In her interview with RT, the child economist expressed her concern that the Canadian government has been borrowing money from private banks and putting the people into debt. "And they are not doing anything about this. So they are just standing by and watching the private banks make us pay compounded interest."

"It has become painfully obvious even for me, a 12-year-old Canadian, that we are being defrauded and robbed by the banking system and a complicit government," Victoria stated in her speech at the conference.

Until the 1970s, the Canadian government borrowed money directly from the Bank of Canada. But in recent decades, it has been borrowing from private banks instead which results in the government paying extra in interest rates to cover private banks' profit margins.

The prodigy's solution to her country's financial problems is that the government "should stop borrowing from private banks and start borrowing from the Bank of Canada with little to no interest."

"The people will then pay fair taxes to repay the Bank of Canada. This tax money would in turn get injected back into our economic infrastructure and the debt would be wiped out. Canadians will again prosper with real money as the foundation of our economic structure," she said.

voted for honorary ET'er. :)

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

Anyone seen 'Mediterranean' ? Such a great flick. The chillum scene is one of the funniest I ever watched.
The whole thing is a cinematic jewel.

It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter

Random musings watching the jubilee on telly... Why the fuss over such an antidiluvian (literally?) exhibition/institution?
Collective Stockholm Syndrome?
Because keeping the rorles is better than the ghastly realisation that it's the likes of Cameron and Osbourne that are in power?
Any excuse for a party I guess.
Hard not to be touched by so much human loyalty and devotion though, no matter the reason.
Useless parasites, or fundamental keystone to a national identity,
or both, or neither?
A giant Truman show perhaps, dating centuries.
Csn't fathom it at all...


It's a fine line between homage, parody, and consumer opportunism. Jess Walter