Musical GOD is back here for now

Due to hosting problems, MUSICAL GOD has returned to blogspot for now.

Hopefully it won't be here too long, and apologies to all whose comments from the past don't show here.

Look at it this way... we all need a chance to make a fresh start now and then.

Mindless reading is fundamental

Stop the presses! Absolutely mind-blowing, stunning new research has been done that will pave the way for tremendous new strides in understanding why some people don't learn as much from reading as others. Or not.

It seems that "checking out" while reading, or "zoning out", may have bad effects on how much the reader retains:

"For the first time, researchers have demonstrated the ill effects of mindless reading — a phenomenon in which people take in sentence after sentence without really paying attention.

Ever read the same paragraph three times? Or get to the end of a page and realize you don't know what you just read?

That's mindless reading. It is the literary equivalent of driving for miles without remembering how you got there — something so common many people don't even notice it.

In a new study of college students, researchers from the University of Pittsburgh and the University of British Columbia established a way to study mindless reading in a lab.

Their findings showed that daydreaming has its costs.

The readers who zoned out most tended to do the worst on tests of reading comprehension — a significant, if not surprising, result. The study also suggested that zoning out caused the poor test results, as opposed to other possible factors, such as the complexity of the text or the task.

The researchers hope their work inspires more research into why zoning out happens, and what can be done to stop it.

Well, now... Maybe we could all, oh, I don't know, pay attention?

I can see it all now... a new diagnosis for people who zone out while reading, complete with prescribed therapies, required interventions by schools, new state and federal codes that define procedures for dealing with the "zoners", etc. People will discover they've been "zoners" for years, and just didn't know it, and now they understand.

I wonder how many new Ph.D.s in education will be awarded for people who study "zoners", create new methodologies for teaching them, and design new curriculum to inculcate "zoner frendliness" into the next crop of educators. I'll bet there will be a state mandated inclusion in all teacher ed programs, covering "zoners" and their needs.

Quickly now, close your eyes... what did you just read?

Nepal faces uncertain future with rebels - Yahoo! News

There seems to be an agreement between the rebels and the government of Nepal, which has had a violent revolution recently.

Those Maoist rebel "democrats" have what they wish. Are they ready for it?: "All that ended June 16 with an agreement to establish an interim government to replace the current national parliament as well as the 'people's government' that rules territory under rebel control.

The Maoists say they will abide by the decisions of a yet-to-be-formed constituent assembly, which will decide what type of government Nepal will have.

But after so many years of living as guerrillas, fighting the government and demanding goals steeped in a Marxist ideology much of the world has long forgotten, the big question is what their leader, known to all as Prachanda, wants for the nation.

The schoolteacher-turned-militant has few democratic credentials, tolerating no dissent as the leader of the guerrillas who call their overriding philosophy 'Prachandapath' — 'Prachanda's Way.'

In interviews since he emerged from hiding, his pronouncements about Nepal's new government have been vague and sometimes contradictory.

'There shouldn't be parliamentary republicanism' in Nepal, he recently told the weekly magazine Nepal. He ruled out an autocracy, but said that 'we need a republicanism of our own kind.' He didn't elaborate.

His plans for the struggling economy are equally hazy.

Despite the basics of the creed named after Mao Zedong, the Chinese communist leader, Prachanda says the rebels will encourage industry, job creation and the quest for profits.

"

I'll believe it when I see it.

Left to Right: the American way

Conversion from life in the real world of the CEO of Whole Foods Market: "Excerpt Of The Day: Business Is Not A Zero-Sum Game"

'At the time I started my business, the Left had taught me that business and capitalism were based on exploitation: exploitation of consumers, workers, society, and the environment. I believed that 'profit' was a necessary evil at best, and certainly not a desirable goal for society as a whole. However, becoming an entrepreneur completely changed my life. Everything I believed about business was proven to be wrong.

The most important thing I learned about business in my first year was that business wasn't based on exploitation or coercion at all. Instead I realized that business is based on voluntary cooperation. No one is forced to trade with a business; customers have competitive alternatives in the market place; employees have competitive alternatives for their labor; investors have different alternatives and places to invest their capital. Investors, labor, management, suppliers — they all need to cooperate to create value for their customers. If they do, then any realized profit can be divided amongst the creators of the value through competitive market dynamics.

In other words, business is not a zero-sum game with a winner and loser. It is a win, win, win, win game — and I really like that. However, I discovered despite my idealism that our customers thought our prices were too high, our employees thought they were underpaid, the vendors would not give us large discounts, the community was forever clamoring for donations, and the government was slapping us with endless fees, licenses, fines, and taxes.

Were we profitable? Not at first. Safer Way managed to lose half of its capital in the first year — $23,000. Despite the loss, we were still accused of exploiting our customers with high prices and our employees with low wages. The investors weren't making a profit and we had no money to donate. Plus, with our losses, we paid no taxes. I had somehow joined the 'dark side' — I was now one of the bad guys. According to the perspective of the Left, I had become a greedy and selfish businessman. At this point, I rationally chose to abandon the leftist philosophy of my youth, because it no longer adequately explained how the world really worked.' -- John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market"

Help the terrorists resist interrogation!

We don't want to surprise the terrorists with any of our interrogation techniques.

Pentagon won't hide interrogation tactics : "Under pressure from Congress, the
Pentagon has dropped plans to keep some interrogation techniques secret by putting them in a classified section of a military manual, defense officials said Tuesday.

...descriptions of interrogation techniques initially planned for the classified section are either being made public or are being eliminated as tactics that can be used against prisoners.

...Military leaders have argued that disclosing all the interrogation techniques public would make it easier for enemy prisoners to resist questioning.

...any interrogation technique not included in the manual would be considered illegal."

This is, of course, in response to the law passed last year, championed by McCain and others, to criminalize "cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners by U.S. troops."

Let's hear it for giving terrorists a chance to practice their resistance techniques. We wouldn't want USA interrogators to have unfair advantage or anything.

Reuters roots for Islamic militia in Somalia?

Experts say US funding Somali warlords - Yahoo! News: "(Reuters) - The United States has been funneling more than $100,000 a month to warlords battling Islamist militia in Somalia, according to a Somalia expert who has conferred with the groups in the country."

Reuters' leftist slip is showing, as usual. The USA is funding "warlords", but the Islamists are "militia"... how noble of them!

Reuters names only one source, John Prendergast, a Senior Adviser at the (non-profit) "International Crisis Group." Prendergast worked in the White House and the State Department in the Clinton administration from 1996-2001, a bit of information Reuters omits, but which bears on the objectivity of Prendergast as the only named source. All the other sources are "anonymous".

Reuters seems to think it's bad for the US to fund anti-Islamist groups in Somalia, and implies the UN is investigating US provision of arms to Somalia "warlords". Outside of the hilarity of the UN investigating anything at all, the obvious point is simple.

Shouldn't the US do what it can to prevent an Islamist takeover of Somalia, with all the potential for Taliban-style rule that would be a certainty?

The Left and the Right

Here are some quotes from the online presence of the Communist Party and the NAZI Party in the USA:

Communist Party USA Online -: "A Call to Action: Defend Democracy, Change Congress in the 2006 Elections!
by CPUSA National Committee, 03/10/2006 15:11
The Bush-Cheney Administration has plunged our nation into the worst Constitutional crisis since the Civil War. The abuses of power they have committed are legion: an illegal pre-emptive war, lying to Congress and the people, warrant-less spying, mass incarceration of innocent people here and around the world, torture, corrupt no-bid contracts with crony corporations like Halliburton, criminal negligence in abandoning the victims of Hurricane Katrina..."

The American Nazi Party: "The year is 2025, White people HAVE become a MINORITY in America. On our streets hang Aryan men who refused to accept the 'New Way,' or perhaps they just looked too White. Perhaps they never thought MUD RULE would really come.
White girls who refuse the advances of Negroids, are publicly gang-raped so as to serve as examples to other shuddering Aryan females. Children are now taken from their houses, by force, to be brought up in a 'Multi-Cultural' home of Negroids, Arabs, Muslims and Gooks, all in the name of 'brotherhood and love'...

And yet, some fight back! Alone or in small cells, Aryans...men and boys...but most of all women who stand the most to lose, since the decline of real men among the White Folk, strike back...at night and with any weapon near at hand."

Aryan Attack (a publication of the National Socialist Movement, a NAZI organization):
"A nation’s economy dramatically influences the daily lives of all of its citizens. Today we suffer under a greed based Jewish economy. From the Jew Alan Greenspan, who heads the nation’s financial decision making body, the Federal Reserve, to the average sheeple who’ve bought into the Jew lie of Wall Street swindler and Jew Ivan Boesky that “greed is healthy,” altruism and the good of the whole is a dead thought. What’s important in today’s society is greed and its accompanying individualism. “It’s all about me” is the prevailing attitude.

In sharp contrast to this self-centered destructive worldview is National Socialism. National Socialism offers the only long term workable economic system. And it’s proven. When the world was suffering through a terrible economic depression, National Socialist Germany was not! What made the Nazi economy work, while the Jew based economies of the rest of the world failed?"

It's pretty common to talk about the Democratic Party in the USA as "the left" and the Republican Party as "the right".

From where I sit, it looks like the Democratic Party is attuned to the very, very far left, the Republican Party sits in the center, and their is no mainstream party on the "right" at all.

Click the links above. Read the sites. Notice how much Democratic rhetoric closely follows the Communist Party, and how distinct Republican rhetoric is from the NAZI Party.

Draw your own conclusions...

Democracy Loving MAOist rebels for democracy... sure, I believe that

According to the AP, in today's article "Rights groups urge sanctions against Nepal leaders", the King of Nepal is a really bad guy. May well be... but does the AP expect us to take seriously the notion of MAOist rebels for democratic rule in Nepal?

Here's a map showing Nepal's proximity to China.

According to the AP:

King Gyanendra sacked the government and assumed full power in February 2005, vowing to crush a decade-old Maoist revolt in which more than 13,000 people have died.

At least five people have been killed and hundreds wounded in police action against pro-democracy protesters, who are into the 13th day of a general strike that has brought the impoverished nation to a standstill.

And:

King Gyanendra has offered to hold elections by April next year, but activists say he cannot be trusted and should immediately hand over power to an all-party government.

....

The United States and India, Nepal's giant neighbour, have both called repeatedly for the restoration of democracy.

This is typical MSM reporting, casting MAOist (likely Chinese backed) rebels as pro-democracy insurgents, and providing no background that really helps anyone to understand the players. Does the USA really back Maoist "freedom fighters"? Doubtful.

Would it help our understanding of the context if the AP bothered to report on which nearby government is supporting the Maoist fighters?

Are there any good guys here? Possibly not... but the wide eyed innocent face value acceptance of Maoist insurgency as "pro-democratic" is laughable.