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Another Letter to the Editor of the New Scientist magazine
The Ward Churchill-Moammar Gadhafi Coincidence?
Dabbling in Astronomy...
A modern day Bedouin Martha's Vineyard in Israel
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rumination.
n.
The act of pondering; meditation.
blog.
n. a personal Web site that provides updated
headlines and news articles of other sites that are of interest
to the user, also may include journal entries, commentaries
and recommendations compiled by the user; also written web
log, Weblog; also called blog (thanks, dictionary.com!)
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Another Letter to the Editor of the New Scientist magazine
One of the magazines I subscribe to, New Scientist, pissed me off yet again with their blatant bias against the deaf, while at the same time glorifying blindness. In the print edition I subscribe to, they had an article declaring the success of restoring hearing to deaf gunea pigs via gene therapy. Yet another example of a pathological attempt to "cure" deafness. In a recent issue, they glorified the increased "brainpower" of those blind, such as Ray Charles. It apparently never occurred to them that Deaf people have extra brainpower, too. Even more so if uncorrupted by repeated and conflicted attempts to minimize the "deafness" via oral-aural regimens.
*** Dear Editor, It is perplexing to me and many others how the mainstream population has an extreme bias towards blindness as opposed to deafness. It is no secret that nearly everyone would prefer be blind rather than deaf. I can perfectly sympathize with the viewpoint that the loss of the ability to enjoy the sensation of music is a profound loss. Being Deaf myself, I naturally want to understand the beauty of music just like I'd imagine a blind person might long to see, and understand, the eccentric beauty of a Salvador Dali painting or to simply partake in the everyday privilege of driving that I am able to enjoy.
In your recent issue, (29 January 2005), your coverage of the human body's wide array of at least 21 senses was very informative. However, much to my dismay, your magazine again glorified the disability of blindness, showing how blind people effectively use their lost sense of vision as additional brainpower for other activities (i.e. Ray Charles). In addition, you showed how blind people are able to use alternative senses to compensate for their lost sense of vision. It would have been great if there was a piece on how deaf people, instead of trying to be pathologically cured of their deafness, effectively use technology to make up for their lost sense of vision.
I, for one, would NEVER give up my sense of vision to simply hear music. I simply love driving too much, or watching TV, going SCUBA diving and being able to engage in a philosophical dialogue underwater in my native sign language, or even being able to see the Cassini Division while viewing Saturn up-close in my new backyard telescope, none of which require any hearing at all.
Thank you,
Jason Lamberton
The Ward Churchill-Moammar Gadhafi Coincidence?
While I was reading this piece about the embattled professor Ward Churchill's alleged plagiarism, I couldn't help but notice the striking resemblance between him and Col. Moammar Gadhafi, the dictator of Libya.
Ward Churchill, head of the Ethnic Studies department at the University of Colorado has recently came under heavy fire for his comments in an essay blaming the victims of 9-11 for the attacks, calling them "little Eichmanns" who were "faceless technocrats" who received the "befitting penalty." Mohamed Atta and his gang of 19 hijackers, were, according to Churchill, no "cowards." And "nor were they 'fanatics' devoted to 'Islamic fundamentalism.'" He even went further than claiming that they weren't religious fundamentalists, that they were actually "secular activists - soldiers, really."
The striking similarities between Churchill and Gadhafi:
  Gadhafi is the fella on the right, and Ward's on the left. it's quite interesting given the fact that in 1983, Ward Churchill went to Tripoli and met with Gadhafi. According to this source,
This is not the first time Ward Churchill has disagreed with the U.S. government's idea of who is, and is not, a terrorist. In April 1983, Churchill went to Libya to meet with Col. Moammar Gadhafi. The U.S. government had banned travel to Libya two years earlier, saying Gadhafi supported terrorism. Churchill traveled to Tripoli and Benghazi as a representative of the International Indian Treaty Council and the American Indian Movement. He went with Dace Means, brother of AIM leader Russell Means. They were seeking recognition from Gadhafi of the U.S. government's breaking of Indian treaties. "The main thing we sought and received was diplomatic support," Churchill told the Associated Press at the time. He added, "AIM has not requested arms from the Libyan government." The meeting took place five years before a bomb exploded on an American passenger jet above the small Scottish town of Lockerbie, killing all 259 people on board and 11 people on the ground. Now, an excerpt from Ward Churchill's essay:
There is simply no argument to be made that the Pentagon personnel killed on September 11 fill that bill [of being legitimate military targets]. The building and those inside comprised military targets, pure and simple. As to those in the World Trade Center...
Well, really. Let's get a grip here, shall we? True enough, they were civilians of a sort. But innocent? Gimme a break. They formed a technocratic corps at the very heart of America's global financial empire - the "mighty engine of profit" to which the military dimension of U.S. policy has always been enslaved - and they did so both willingly and knowingly. Recourse to "ignorance" - a derivative, after all, of the word "ignore" - counts as less than an excuse among this relatively well-educated elite. To the extent that any of them were unaware of the costs and consequences to others of what they were involved in - and in many cases excelling at - it was because of their absolute refusal to see. More likely, it was because they were too busy braying, incessantly and self-importantly, into their cell phones, arranging power lunches and stock transactions, each of which translated, conveniently out of sight, mind and smelling distance, into the starved and rotting flesh of infants. If there was a better, more effective, or in fact any other way of visiting some penalty befitting their participation upon the little Eichmanns inhabiting the sterile sanctuary of the twin towers, I'd really be interested in hearing about it. Of course, I am not advocating that he be lynched or be put in some federal gulag deep under Yucca Mountain. After all, this is America, and I can say anything I want, right? However, no one can take him seriously if he also says in his essay: Evil - for those inclined to embrace the banality of such a concept - was perfectly incarnated in that malignant toad known as Madeline [sic] Albright, squatting in her studio chair like Jaba [sic] the Hutt, blandly spewing the news that she'd imposed a collective death sentence upon the unoffending youth of Iraq. So, bottom line, because Ward Churchill seems to idolize Col. Moammar Gadhafi so much to the point where he looks like the dictator himself, Ward ought take a lesson from Moammar. A raving lunatic DOES have opportunities to clean his or her act up. Moammar got caught trying to smuggle nuclear materials into Libya, and he quickly cleaned up his act, muted his criticisms of the "evil West," and began an rapprochement with the formerly "evil ones." In the process of bad-mouthing his fellow Americans, Ward got caught with repeated cases of plagiarism, copied artwork being passed on as his own, and fraudulently posing as a red-blooded American Indian, of the Keetoowah Cherokee tribe.
Moammar kept his job as dictator of Libya when he stopped badmouthing and threatening the West even though he was caught with something illegal - nuclear materials. Saddam was suspected of having what Moammar actually had - and he lost his job as a result, despite supposedly having nothing. Fearful of being fired by the U.S. military like Saddam was, Moammar quickly wised up. Ward finds himself in the same shoes Moammar was in last year (albeit much smaller, but as guilty). So if Ward wants to keep his $96,000 job, he should act wise, clean up his act and stop his inciting rhetoric. Then, he will get away with his plagiarism.
Hmmm... Now a thought comes to mind... If I ever want to get some kind of charge dropped against me, I should already be a thorn in the government's back, the thorn being my trump card. I'd be in a position to either make the thorn hurt worse or make the pain go away, a win-win situation.
**ADDENUM**
I wouldn't be doing my fellow Americans justice if I didn't add some more snippets from Ward Churchill's essay, and let you come to your own conclusion whether if his writing has a subversive tone. From what I understand, subversive speech is not free speech, nor is yelling "FIRE!" in a crowded theater.
Were the opportunity acted upon in some reasonably good faith fashion - a sufficiently large number of Americans rising up and doing whatever is necessary to force an immediate lifting of the sanctions on Iraq, for instance, or maybe hanging a few of America's abundant supply of major war criminals (Henry Kissinger comes quickly to mind, as do Madeline [sic] Albright, Colin Powell, Bill Clinton and George the Elder) - there is every reason to expect that military operations against the US on its domestic front would be immediately suspended.
Whether they would remain so would of course be contingent upon follow-up. By that, it may be assumed that American acceptance of onsite inspections by international observers to verify destruction of its weapons of mass destruction (as well as dismantlement of all facilities in which more might be manufactured), Nuremberg-style trials in which a few thousand US military/corporate personnel could be properly adjudicated and punished for their Crimes Against humanity, and payment of reparations to the array of nations/peoples whose assets the US has plundered over the years, would suffice. [emphases mine]
I know one thing for sure. I will receive a visit from the Secret Service if I seriously talk about executing our President, whether current or former (or in other words, assassination). It is funny, who's being bloodthirsty here? It is not like Americans are clamoring for the hanging of Saddam Hussein. There ARE certain Americans longing for the day George W. Bush gets lynched and hanged by a mob, Mussolini-fashion.
**DISCLAIMER** To the person at NSA reading this blog, note my emphasis of the word "serious." If you happen to have no sense of humor, I, in no way, was condoning the assassination of our government officials. That was Ward Churchill, not me. *points finger in the direction of Colorado*
Dabbling in Astronomy...
Due to the sheer physical limitations of the human's brain to partake in multiple simultaneous processes, my brain has developed some kind of allergy to typing. For some reason, I have found it quite a challenge to satisfactorily express myself when it comes to blogging, e-mailing, instant messaging, paging, programming, and so on. Frankly, typing now feels like it acts like a funnel against my cerebellum's flow of neurons. I can't wait till the day comes when that no longer is a realization. The BrainPort, a device that connects to the computer via the USB port, gives us a tantalizingly interesting glimpse into the future. It is a sensory subsitution device in which people are able to use an existing sense in place of another. Or, in other words, I have a very aggressive form of writer's block that only technology from the future can cure. Fortunately, I do not have a case of creative block.
Back to the subject of this entry: my venture into amateur astronomy. There have been a couple of things I have always asked every birthday and Christmas, and a telescope was always in the top 3 of my wishlist. Unfortunately for my parents, I had (and obviously still have) a lot of expensive hobbies, which means I only got to actively pursue a minimal number of them. The great thing about being an adult is that you can still be a kid at heart, albeit having much more money which enables you to procure grown-up toys much more easily than begging for them twice a year.
After a long time seriously considering getting a telescope, I decided to take the plunge and purchase one. However, I knew that there were too many choices out there, and I definitely did not want the typical kids' bedroom telescope that does not give you a breathtaking view of our planets and other celestial objects. Naturally, before taking such a big step (read: more than $1k), one would be wise to do his/her research, so I did. After some Google-assisted research on the Internet, I concluded, in no Napoleonic fashion, that bigger is better.
I went for the biggest telescope Orion Telescopes had to offer, a 12-inch diameter Newtonian reflecting telescope, mounted on a Dobsonian base. Man, is it huge! It is taller than some people I know (and fatter in a few cases).
 Unlike some well-endowed men, this telescope did not disappoint! Indeed, it will do a great job reintroducing the ancient awesomity of our planets up there in the otherwise mundane sky.
Here are some pictures from my first venture into astrophotography, which is not as simple as it seems to be! The human eye definitely perceives Saturn much sharper than my measly 4.0 megapixel digital camera did, as evident from these blurry pictures. But, you get the idea of HOW BIG the planets get to be! With time, my experience will improve and I will learn how to minimize the ambient vibrations that cause the blurriness of the photos, and to compensate for the relatively quick motion of the planets in order to take longer-exposure photos, which will bring out the finer details that our ocular organs detect.
Saturn
 Hmmm, this might explain some UFO sightings...

Additional photographs
A modern day Bedouin Martha's Vineyard in Israel
I happened across this article which I found quite interesting, which talks about Al-Sayyid Beduin Sign Language, which is used by 3,500 deaf and hearing people in a village in Israel's Negev desert. This language seems quite sophiscated and is a great modern-day example of how deaf people can really communicate and get along.
Bedouin sign language points to foundations of grammar
08/01/2004 - 08/31/2004
09/01/2004 - 09/30/2004
10/01/2004 - 10/31/2004
11/01/2004 - 11/30/2004
12/01/2004 - 12/31/2004
01/01/2005 - 01/31/2005
02/01/2005 - 02/28/2005
03/01/2005 - 03/31/2005
04/01/2005 - 04/30/2005
06/01/2005 - 06/30/2005
07/01/2005 - 07/31/2005
08/01/2005 - 08/31/2005
09/01/2005 - 09/30/2005
10/01/2005 - 10/31/2005
11/01/2005 - 11/30/2005
01/01/2006 - 01/31/2006
03/01/2006 - 03/31/2006
05/01/2006 - 05/31/2006
06/01/2006 - 06/30/2006
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For
me, this site will be less of a personal diary and daily pulpit,
rather, it will focus strongly on being an e-soapbox for my
political issues of concern, and to highlight the technological
advances that will uniquely benefit us, the Deaf tribe, and
simply a portal for everything else that constitutes the Artist
Formerly Known As An Embryonic Stem Cell, Jason C. Lamberton.
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THE LAMBERTON REPORT
Not Wanting to Earn Their Wings: Graying Pilots Lament Decline in Interest Among Young
CNN.com - Mergers proposed for schools for blind and deaf
Getting More Than 'Halfway to Anywhere'
SPACE.com -- Mars Analog on Earth: Taking a Trek in the Outback
LiveScience.com Blogs - Sex in Space: Getting a Grip on Gravity
Storms push firefighters off front lines
FDA Says No to Bionic Eye (why don't they say NO to the Cochlear Implant?!)
Amateur Farmers Find A Paradise, Unpaved
Gadgets get the feel of the tactile world
LiveScience.com Blogs - Half of All Languages Headed for Extinction
LiveScience.com - What a Trip: Psychedelic Drug Study Recalls the '60s
Washingtonpost.com - Drug's Mystical Properties Confirmed
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