Bradley Manning Decision

So, I've heard that Bradley Manning has been found guilty of most of the charges he was accused of, although he wasn't found guilty of aiding the enemy, which I suppose is good news.  But the fact that he was found guilty of most of the charges is not good news.  From where I'm sitting, it seems like the press is less and less able to really pry into the deep workings of the government.  This is a drastic reduction of the press' abilities.  While it may seem that news stories are getting more and more invasive, and that nothing is safe, that's not really true.  While it is exceedingly easy to ruin a person's reputation by finding out that they're having an affair, or they said something stupid when they thought they were off the record, doing that isn't the press' key function.  It's too superficial.  What the press should be doing is what Bradley Manning did, and what Snowden is also doing.  Bringing forth the deep, dark secrets of the government.  Without the determination of the press, Watergate would never have happened.  In today's climate, it seems to me that exposing something on that order would not be tolerated.  We may pride ourselves in creating a transparent society, and maybe we have, but the one section of society that most demands it has gone dark.  If the government doesn't need to worry about accountability, we risk losing other freedoms, some of which you might find important.  I don't think this will happen, I think sooner or later someone will make a stand to reinvigorate the press, but I do hope it comes soon.

Short Story Part 3

 Here's the next part of the short story I've been sharing.

           When I stepped outside the next morning, only a couple of clouds spoiled the bright blue sky.  I sighed.  I had been to this part of the country before, and I knew what morning clouds meant.  A thunderstorm this afternoon.  Of course, a lack of clouds was no guarantee of a nice day, but at least the option was out there.

            I didn’t care if it rained.  It had been too long since I had been in real mountains.  So I drove out, and at the first trail I found, I pulled off and set off down the path.  I loved hiking, it was about the only thing my parents and I had agreed on.  When I was still a kid, we spent many weekends backpacking in the Berkshires, and I always enjoyed it.  They were probably just trying to groom me to get involved in the cause though.  Damn subtext.  Ruins everything.

            The trail, lined with Ponderosa pines, quickly angled up the mountain.  I relished the challenge.  After so much time meandering across the Plains, the notion of actually going up was refreshing.

            It didn’t take long to reach the top of the mountain.  The pines had thinned out a bit, so I could get some decent views, but I wanted something better.  As I gazed about, I noticed the next mountain was taller, with a great stone escarpment jutting out from the summit.  I glanced at my watch.  10:30.  Not a problem.

            It was almost 2 when I reached the top of the next mountain.  I was tired, I’d been walking at a very brisk pace for about 5 hours now over difficult terrain.  But as I scaled the great stone slab, I was glad I’d done it.  Clouds scudded across the sky now; I gave myself 3 hours before the thunderstorm came.  No way I’d get back to the car before then.  I looked out over the plain before me.  It truly was a breathtaking sight, seeing the earth stretch away from me like that.  Just miles upon miles of open space, the only thing limiting my view was the curvature of the Earth itself.  There was no humidity out here, and the temperature was a balmy 80 degrees.  I breathed in deeply, I could live with this.

            The sky darkened dramatically as I head back.  I looked up and I could see the storm in its entirety, from one edge of the thunderhead to the other.  It did look like a great anvil hovering with ill malice in the sky.  I braced myself for the downpour, but mercifully, it never came.  The sky cleared off again as the sun began to set, turning the sky to a brilliant orange as I got back to my car, after 11 hours out on the trail, absolutely exhausted.  I hadn’t done anything so strenuous in a long time. 

            I drove back to the bar and slumped onto a barstool.  Again, classic rock was playing on the radio, and I grinned as I immediately recognized the song.  It was one of my favorites.

            “You want something?” the bartender asked.

            “Some painkillers,” I groaned.  “I walked a long way today.  I think like 25 miles.”

            “That’s quite a hike,” he said.  “Why’d ya go that far?”

            “I wanted to get on top of that big stone cliff on top of one of the mountains,” I explained.  “It looked important.”

            “Ah, yes,” he nodded.  “Round here we call it the Tooth of Time.”

            I thought about it for a moment.  I suppose it had looked like a giant molar.  “I can see that.  It was a spectacular view from up there.”

            “I never get tired of it,” he smiled.  “And I’ve lived here my whole life.”

            “This is certainly a great town you’ve got here,” I said as the barman sat my drink down in front of me.  Suddenly, I heard a great commotion outside.  I rushed outside to find an improbable sight.  The parking lot was surrounded by Priuses, and about 20 men in plaid shirts and skinny jeans were standing about with evil in their eyes, and of more pressing concern, chainsaws in their hands.  I couldn’t believe it.  A roving gang of environmentalists.  They had gotten past the cities back home, but not out here.  They shouldn’t be here!  But here they were, miles away from any urban center.  I…I had hoped that I would never have to see one of these people again.

            “What the hell do you think you’re doing to my car!” Bob roared as the environmentalists bore down on his Charger.

            “These things are an abomination to nature,” the gang leader stepped forward without fear.  “It’s our duty to rid the world of these polluting monsters.”

            “But it’s my car!  You can’t just go and take a saw to it!” he yelled.

            “I think we can,” the leader sneered.  “We outnumber you by quite a healthy margin.”

            “Pfft,” Bob scowled.  “A bunch of city trash like you?  You don’t got the guts to get your girly hands dirty.  You wouldn’t want to break your texting hand.”

            “We use both hands to text nowadays,” the gang leader said with utter disdain.  “What century do you live in?”

            Bob had had quite enough of this.  He let out a wild roar and charged at the gang leader.  Then, he was lying on the ground.  I wasn’t sure what had happened, but I saw that this man was not to be underestimated.

            “You…you won’t get away with this!” Bob gasped for air.

            “What, are you going to report us?” the gang leader laughed, joined by his companions.  “You think we didn’t consider that?  No, we are quite capable of dealing with your local constable and his donut-shoving cohorts.  And once we get back to Colorado, we’ll be beyond reach.  We run the police there, if anything, they’ll arrest you if you follow us.”  I was surprised, I knew Bob had said that Denver had been lost, but the entire state?

            I sighed.  I had no choice.  I didn’t want to do this, I had wanted with all my heart to leave this behind, but it had come back to me anyway.  The people of this town didn’t deserve what was coming to them, and I knew I could stop them.  This guy wasn’t just another follower, he had a brain, and he could be reasoned with.  But he had strong convictions, it wouldn’t be easy.  Fortunately, I had some pretty shocking truths to back me up.

Enjoying Summer

I don't know what the weather's like everywhere, but here where I live, it's been absolutely wonderful for the past few days.  Highs in the upper 70's, plenty of sun, and no thunderstorms, a pleasant change from this time last month.  In short, it's been the perfect weather to get out and enjoy the outdoors, something that I really do relish.  I'm an outdoors person, I love being outside, and I personally think that spending plenty of time out in the sun is a very good thing.  Too often we become complacent and sit inside unless we have to go out.  I know I'm often guilty of this.  But I know after a good long walk I feel much better, so my advice to people everywhere: get outside and do something.  I walk, and I play golf, both are wonderful activities, but by no means are they the only things I could be doing.  There's literally an entire world out there, go out and enjoy it.

Deep Space 9

After about 3 months, I've finally gotten through all of Star Trek: Deep Space 9.  I must say, it was a very good show.  You tend not to hear too much about DS9, it kind of gets lost in the discussion, everybody loves TOS and TNG, everybody hates Voyager and Enterprise, but nobody really has an opinion on DS9.  I think because it not much of a Star Trek.  What I mean by that is there isn't much exploring, meeting new life and new civilizations, and no boldly going.  Sure, the wormhole opens up a whole new section of the galaxy, but any expansion into the Gamma Quadrant is ended quickly by the introduction of the Dominion.  Most of the series is very localized, very much centered on the station and the planets nearby, Bajor, Cardassia, and the Badlands.  Because of this, there aren't many one-off encounters in this show, if the main characters have a big encounter with something, the consequences of it will have lasting effects. 

The plots of shows were also not very Star Trekky.  There wasn't much technobabble solutions to problems, and many times the resolution to the show's plot was distinctly unsatisfying.  The big example off the top of my head is the second to last episode of the sixth season, where the Defiant is trying to reach a Starfleet officer  marooned on a barely survivable planet.  The entire time, the crew and this officer are conversing, and she works her way into the hearts of the crew.  The ship arrives just in the nick of time only to discover that distortions in the planet's atmosphere caused the communications to be timeshifted.  The woman had been dead for years, and she died believing she would be saved.  It was a real blow to the gut.

The Dominion War storyline was brilliant as well.  The space battles were exciting despite their age, more exciting than the stuff we get in our Star Trek now.  The show really played up the reality of war, with constant mention of casualties, you really felt the pain the war was causing these characters.  I think this was the best Star Trek has ever been, and it's funny, because it's really not Star Trek at all.  While it was goofy at times, it was really a great drama.

It has to be said that Captain Sisko is my favorite of all the captains.  Picard gets all the love for being the moral center of the universe, but Sisko was just so much more formidable.  When Sisko got mad, which was quite often, the intimidation he threw off was incredible.  The viewer could feel it, and the characters certainly could as well.  Also, he could be brutal if you really got on his bad side.  He poisoned an entire planet just to capture one man, but that man had betrayed him.  And of course there's the episode, "In the Pale Moonlight," which is by general consensus the best episode of the series.

I would give the show a 9 out of 10.  I highly recommend people watch it, it may take some time to get into, but once you do, it is a highly rewarding experience.

Global Warming

I just read an interesting article on the current global warming situation, which can be found here:

http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/24/world/climate-arctic-methane/index.html?hpt=hp_t3

If methane is being released, that means that the average temperature of the planet is going to rise.  What the article doesn't really talk about is the exponential nature of methane release.  There's a lot of methane frozen in permafrost, but only a small amount is entering the atmosphere right now, as the temperature isn't warm enough.  But the released methane raises the temperature even more, which means that more permafrost melts, and even more methane enters the atmosphere.  This cycle will continue until all the methane is released, and by that point the planet will be rather warm.  A situation like this has happened before, about 55 million years ago.  The planet's temperature shot up to an average of 90 degrees Fahrenheit, and there were no ice caps.  I know we're supposed to feel bad for the plight of polar bears, but let's face facts, ice is the enemy of life.  The only reason life exists there is because they've found some way to cheat, but if there was no ice, biodiversity would explode, as the environment would become suitable to more generalized life.  The downside is that if the ice were to melt, the oceans would rise quite a bit.  These are the facts.  Hopefully I've presented things in as unbiased a manner as possible.

Team Fortress Tuesday #2

Hello, and welcome to this week's edition of Team Fortress Tuesday.  I think today I'll talk about the recent balance update to the game, and what I think of everything.  They changed a lot of weapons, most of which were for the better.  And of course, there are two more maps, Standin and Process.

Standin is a crazy map.  You really have to watch your back, because Standin is pretty much Scout heaven.  There are a ton of flank routes, so unless you have eyes on the back of your head, you're gonna have to deal with surprise Scouts quite a bit.  My big complaint about this map is that there aren't enough health packs, considering the Team Deathmatch style.

Process is a great map.  It is fun as all hell to play Soldier on this map, because of all the rampslides.  You can get to mid faster than Demos can, which is saying something.  Seriously though, this map is really good, and it's quickly joined the few maps I consider the best, along with Gravel Pit, Badlands, and Gullywash.  If you haven't tried it yet, go, it's seriously a lot of fun.

A lot of weapons got rebalanced, but to be completely honest, I'm not too familiar with all the changes, since I don't use most of the weapons that got changed.  The weapons that affected me that got changed were the Quick-Fix, Gunslinger, and Powerjack.  The Quick-Fix is now essentially equal to the stock and the Kritzkrieg, and more importantly, it's fun.   You really feel actively engaged when using it, and if you've got a trustworthy Soldier by your side, you can sail around the map with him.  The Gunslinger no longer heals damage while being built, which isn't a big deal for me, since I use the minis properly.  Still, it is a change, and there have been a couple of times where I've been killed because my mini was killed too quickly.  The change, while small, was enough to really make the mini balanced, at least in my opinion.  The Powerjack got changed so that having the set no longer gives you a passive speed boost, but having it out gives you a slightly faster speed boost.  It's useful for 5CP maps, but that about it.  I still like the Powerjack, and frankly I've been using it a bit more often than before, but I felt the Gas Jockey set gave some variety to Pyro, and that variety has been lost.

All in all, I'd say this was a great update, and it should hopefully encourage people to use weapons that aren't as annoying.

A Short Story, Part 2

Here's another section of a short story I wrote fairly recently, you can find the first part here:

http://looseontheinternet.blogspot.com/2013/07/a-bit-of-writing.html 

             

             I nodded in appreciation, and the barman walked off to attend to his other customers.  I shot down the bourbon and walked out to grab my bags.  When I got outside, I was amused to see three men staring intently at my car.  This didn’t happen often enough. 

            “Is this the 4.2 or 3.8?” the man in a Led Zeppelin shirt said. 

            “It’s the 4.2,” the man with the cowboy boots replied.

            “How do you know?” the man with a gray beard and military beret said.

            “Because it says ‘Jaguar 4.2 Litre E-type’ on the back,” the cowboy smiled.

            “Can I help you gentlemen?” I said loudly.  The three of them jumped in unison and turned around to face me.

            “Uh, we were just looking…” the first man’s voice trailed off.

            “It’s alright,” I smiled.  “I don’t mind at all.  Name’s Eric.  I’m new in town.”

            “I’m Bob,” the first man said, “that’s Stephen,” pointing to the second man, “and that’s Bill,” pointing to the third man.

            “This is one helluva car,” Stephen said.  “How long you had it?”

            “About a year,” I replied.  “I found it sitting in a recycling plant, about to get destroyed.  I couldn’t let that happen.”

            “Who in God’s name would destroy an E-type?” Bill was incredulous.  “It’s gotta be worth at least a hundred grand.”

            “It was a recycling plant in Boston.  I used to live in Boston.”  The three of them immediately understood.

            “I’m surprised that the damn thing even got to a recycling plant,” Bob said.  “I can’t believe it wasn’t destroyed as soon as people saw it.  I mean, my cousin nearly got lynched when he drove his Camaro into Denver.  And Denver’s bad, but it ain’t that bad.”

            “You don’t have to be mild about it,” I said.  “Boston’s full of militant environmentalists.  I mean it too.  It’s literally the only thing they think about.  Every city in the Northeast is like that, and it’s starting to spread to the towns as well.  It’s an entirely different place.  Riots in the cities, industry under siege, it’s awful.  And of course, the damn government hasn’t done anything to stop it.”

            “Well, course not,” Bob was bitter.  “President’s as green as the rest of them.  Thank God we got a Republican governor.”

            “Exactly.  That’s why I left.  I couldn’t take the madness anymore.  So I took the Jag and left.  It wasn’t easy, I had to pay off four different people, and sneak the car out in the middle of the night.  Driving this thing through Massachusetts and New York was probably the most dangerous thing I’ve ever done.”

            “I can imagine,” Bill said.  “So, what’re you doing now?”

            “Driving,” I said.  “I’ve been driving ever since I left.  To be honest, finding this car was the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me.  I never felt at home in Boston, and this car gave me an excuse to leave.  I haven’t gone back.  Haven’t even been tempted.”

            “So you been driving for a year then?” Stephen was shocked.

            “Yup,” I said.

            “Well, we can at least make you feel at home here,” Bob said.  “You play pool?”

            “I’ve spent a lot of time in bars,” I grinned.  “Of course I play pool.”

            “Good, let’s go,” Bob smiled, and we walked into the bar.  We got some drinks, and set right to work with our game.  It didn’t take long for me to figure out that these guys knew what they were doing.  Normally, I swept up everyone I played, but Bob and Bill worked like a machine.  I was impressed.

            “You’re good,” Bob said to me after the third game.  “Bill never gets a good partner, he must be thrilled.”

            “I am,” Bill said.  “I don’t suppose you’re planning on sticking around, Eric?  We could sure use a guy like you around here.”  The question threw me for a moment.  I had never stayed in a town for more than one night.  The fact that I even had to think about it was shocking. 

            “I don’t know,” I said.

British Open 2013

I can't believe the day has come where Phil Mickelson won a British Open.  At Muirfield no less, probably the least forgiving course of his particular brand of erratic play.  I've been watching this tournament for 13 years now, and every time I took comfort in the thought that Phil Mickelson would never win a British Open.  I'm sorry, but I don't care for him.  He's got the world's goofiest smile, and it just bugs me.  It's unfortunate, because otherwise I could relate, we both play an aggressive game and rely on our ability to recoer.  Of course, he does it a little better than I do.  And I suppose I have to give credit where credit is due, he shot a 66 today, so he won it fair and square.  It might have been nice if everyone else hadn't choked and given him a run, but I think Phil does deserve this one.  It pains me to say that.  The golf course looked spectacular, brown and fast, the way a links course is supposed to look and play.  The past few have been green fests, and frankly that makes for a less interesting British Open.  I'm sorry country club golfers, but you're spoiled.  Fast and firm conditions are just more fun, I honestly look forward to seeing my home course brown out in the summer because it makes it more challenging and more interesting.  I'd love to see conditions like it more often on the Tour.

Legend of Korra Season 2

So, after more than a year of waiting, fans of Legend of Korra know when the next season of the show is coming.  It's going to be a difficult couple of months for fans of the show, but at least now we know.  I suppose I should clarify why this is such a big deal, Avatar: The Last Airbender is my favorite TV show of all time, and while the first season of Korra wasn't quite as good, it was still pretty good.  The thing with both Avatar and Korra is that there tends to be big gaps in between seasons.  I remember thinking for quite a while that Avatar had gotten cancelled after its second season because it had been so long.  And if you know how the second season ended, you'll understand how intolerable and unsatisfying that season finale was.  I was only 14 or 15 though, and I didn't have regular internet access, and looking up information about the show didn't even occur to me.  I just remember being incredibly excited and relieved when the third season showed up.  This time, I knew Korra hadn't been cancelled, and in some respects, that made things worse, because I couldn't get it out of my mind.  Constantly looking up any sort of update I could find was torture, although at least this time I had the comics to help tide me over.  I can't wait for September.

Here's the Season 2 Trailer, it looks really cool

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ftLm52V1y0

A Bit of Writing

I do love to write fiction, so I thought I'd put up an a bit of a short story I wrote for a college writing class.  I think it's pretty good, but I may be biased.           

            The Sangre de Cristo Mountains loomed large as I hurtled across the high plains of New Mexico.  I was glad to see them.  It had been too long since I had seen mountains.

            The road was lonely, but occasionally a car tore past.  Each time, I noted with satisfaction, the driver gazed at me with envy.  You get a lot of looks when you drive around in the work of art that is a Series 1 E-type Jaguar Roadster. 

            The sky was fading from the pink and orange of evening to the deep blue of night as I drove into a town nestled at the foot of the mountains.  Cimarron.  How southwestern.

            I was mildly disappointed when I pulled into the town’s bar that it was not made of adobe.  Many of the houses I had passed had been, and they just looked like they belonged. 

            I looked around the parking lot to see how worried I needed to be about my car getting stolen.  The one downside of owning an E-type.  I had no reason to worry, though.  Classic cars of every era were here, from a first-generation Mustang to the last generation of Corvette.  I was going to get by in this town just fine.

            The bar was a fairly large one, with tables for regular dining, some booths, a pool table and a couple of arcade machines in the back.  I immediately noticed that the jukebox was playing classic rock, a fantastic change from practically every other bar I’d been to.  I got tired of listening to, well, really any sort of music that bars played.  Always new stuff, and since I have the musical tastes of a 60-year-old man, I couldn’t stand any of it.

            “What can I get ya, son?” the barman asked as I sat down.

            “Some bourbon, please,” I said. 

            The barman gave me a good look.  I decided to return the favor.  He was in his mid-50’s, I’d guess, slightly balding and fairly tall.  “You’re new here, ain’t ya?” the man said as he got me my drink.  “Ain’t seen you here before.”

            “Maybe I’m just coming to the bar for the first time.”

            “No,” he shook his head.  “Everyone in this town comes here.  This is where everything happens.  This is where things get done.”

            “Must be a small town,” I said.

            “Or maybe I keep a good bar,” he suggested with an edge in his voice.

            “Calm down,” I grinned.  “This looks like a fine place.  And you’re right, I am new in town.  Just passing through.”

            “Where you headed?”

            “Nowhere.  I’m just driving until I stop feeling like it.”

            “Must be an awful drain of gas.  Unless you’re one of those queer types who drives them city-slicker cars.  Abominations, I say.  They got no soul.”

            I chuckled.  These really were my kind of people.  “No, I’m not one of those people.  I’m driving the Jag.”

            The barman glanced out the window and whistled in appreciation.  “An E-type?  That sure is a thing of beauty right there.  You must have quite a chunk of change if you’re driving ‘round in one of them.”

            “Not that much,” I said.  “That’s pretty much all I have right there.  A few bags and my Jag.”

            “How long you work on that one?” the man smiled.  “Got the nice rhyme and everything.”

            “Longer then it should have,” I admitted.  “So, what is there to do around here?  Anything worth the time of a man on the road?”

            “That depends.  We got a beautiful set of mountains here.  Other than that, we don’t got anything any other town don’t have.”

            I thought about it for a moment.  As much as I loved driving, something appealed to me about a walk in the mountains.  I had done a lot of hiking as a kid, and I suppose I still harbored a great love for it.  Maybe I just wanted to try a mode of transportation that wasn’t driving.  Just for a day.

            “You know, I think that I’ll take you up on those mountains,” I said.  “Are there any trails?  I don’t want to go cross-country unless I have to.”

            “There are some trails around, though to be honest, we usually just make our own way around if we need to go in the mountains.  Guess it’s just cause we live here,” the bartender said.

            “Exactly.  I don’t live here, so I’ll respect the mountains.  Where can a man spend the night in this town?  I can’t exactly sleep in my car.  Well, I mean, I can, but it’s not comfortable.”

            “No, probably wouldn’t be,” he said thoughtfully.  “I’ve got some rooms upstairs, and I’d be happy to let you rent one for a few days.  Usually I save them for people who get really drunk and can’t go back home, but I’ll make an exception for you.”

            “Thanks,” I said.  “I appreciate it.  I’ll take another shot of bourbon actually, if it’s not too much trouble.  I know I’ve been eating up your time here.”

            “Oh, no trouble at all.  And it’s still early too, so I can give you time.  In a couple hours though?  Forget it.  Actually, feel free to bring your bags up to one of the rooms.  Here, let me get you a key.”  He fumbled around behind the bar for a moment, then emerged with a key in hand.  “There you go.  Hope you enjoy it here.”