Thursday

Good morning,

Quote of the day:

“People love others not for who they are but for how they make them feel.”

                                     Irwin Federman

A while back my brother and I was discussing possible space travel. We decided that space travel is impossible with our present technology. Here is the reasoning: The closest galaxy to us is about 4 light years away but we do not know if a planet exists there that would support human life or not. But if we found out there was a life supporting planet a round trip would be at least 8 years at the speed of light. Einstein says that an object gains mass the faster it goes. So as an object increases speed the more thrust it would need to keep accelerating. Eventually the speed and the thrust required to accelerate would be equal and acceleration would cease. This terminal speed would just be a fraction of the speed of light. Speed is not our enemy, time is. We have to find a way to overcome time or we ain't going nowhere.

There has been a hell of a lot of hell raised about a prom party having their picture made with them below a Confederate flag and holding a selection of long guns (rifles, shotguns,etc.). What the hell is the problem? What if the flag was a Swastika? Would there be as much hell raised? The answer is no. The media revels in anything that stirs up racial tension because it gives them something to write about. If those people want to wallow in something racial it is their privilege. I don't give a shit one way or another but I can assure you that racial prejudice exists in this country from one end to the other...and it is a street with many lanes...it goes many directions.

Past history has proven that the civilizations that lived in that area from the north end of the Persian Gulf, up the Tigris and Euphrates river all the way into present day Syria were the first to have organized cities that prospered. There is no question that in this area at the beginning of organized cities there were huge forests from horizon to horizon. Why then do those people in these areas in present day would be unable to feed themselves if they had no oil and Europe has vastly surpassed them in being able to sustain themselves? What happened was this:

The people in the area of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers began to cut the trees to build huge and opulent palaces, burn wood as fuel, used wood planking as road bases and even burned wood to make plaster to dress the walls of nearly every building. The lack of predictable rainfall in the amount that would be required to promote the restoration of the forests spelled doom early. After the trees were nearly gone grasses began to take root in the still rich soil but the people began to run gigantic herds of goats and sheep across the landscape. Goats and sheep do not bite off a blade of grass like cattle but pull them up by the roots which destroyed the lands ability to combat erosion. The desert moved in and the rich soil was replaced by sand with a high salt content and that was all she wrote. Hardly any soil was left that would sustain vegetation. Like nearly all paleontologist say that if it was not for oil these people would be on the ragged edge of starvation. There is such a thing as Earth husbandry but it is too late for some.

This reminds me of a story. Toward the end of the “Dust Bowl” days here in the US it was determined that most of the farms in the mid-western US were not taking appropriate care of the soil and that was the reason it was blowing away. The Department of Agriculture sent agents throughout the hardest struck areas in “America's Breadbasket” to teach crop rotation, water conservation, wind powered water wells, contour plowing to prevent erosion, etc. One agent was giving a lecture on these procedures to a group of farmers when one of them stood up and said “You can't tell me anything, Sonny. I have wore out three farms already.”

This Date in History May 7

1896 Earlier a man named Herman Mudgett was born in New Hampshire. He started at an early age torturing animals showing what kind of demon was inside. He was a smart person and attended the University of Michigan and graduated with a medical degree. He financed his education by insuring non-existent people and gathering the insurance money upon presenting a corpse as the insured. In the meantime he had changed his name to Dr. H. H. Holmes. Holmes moved to Chicago in 1886 and went to work as a pharmacist. He eventually bought the pharmacy from the female owner. Soon thereafter the woman disappeared and was never seen again. Through a series of cons Holmes was able to buy a big house across the street from the pharmacy that he called the “castle”. Holmes fitted all the bedrooms with camouflaged gas outlets and he rented some of those bedrooms during the Chicago Worlds Fair and killed the occupants with gas, dissected them, and sold their skeletons to medical schools. He was finally caught using a corpse in another insurance scam and said “I was born with the devil in me; I could not help the fact that I was a murderer, no more than a poet cannot be inspired to sing.” This monster existed at the same time as the infamous “Jack the Ripper” in London but he did not achieve the notoriety. Holmes went to meet his maker at the end of a rope. The police searched his “castle” and found the remains of over 200 people. I wonder where he is today.

Died today:

399BC Greek philosopher Socrates. He said “Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.” This man was ahead of his time...way ahead.

1868 English politician Henry Brougham. He said “A lawyer is a learned gentleman who saves your estate from your enemies and keeps it for himself.” I was the executor of my mother’s estate and had many dealings with lawyers. Henry is right.

Thanks for listening I can hardly wait until tomorrow