Jeff Korson of the local paper The Tifton Gazette has excelled himself this week in an opinion entitled Comprehending Agendas. The only way he could have made it better would have been to call it Comprehending Conspiracies. Link: http://tiftongazette.com/opinion/x1241063294/Your-Opinion-Comprehending-agendas.
Who is it that Jeff doesn't like?
In order of appearance we have:
# Media including books, magazines, radio, TV and movies.
# Homosexuals
# Degenerates. Great word! Don't hear enough of it these days.
# Promiscuous people.
# Communists
# The Federal Government.
# Global warming supporters
# Unions
# Darwinists (and probably all science)
# Rev Jim Wallis
# Feminists
# Russians
# Finally, anybody who listens to the Federal Government.
So Jeff clearly isn't going to take any nonsense from any of these people. Which leaves the question, what guides his moral compass and leads him to call these people "abomination to God"? It can't be the Bible. I don't recall commandment 11 "Thou shalt loudly reject feminists".
Where Jeff gets his opinions from is Glenn Beck. Who in turn is a hard right, paranoid and delusional nutcase working for a Fox News which is owned by News Corporation which is owned by Rupert Murdoch. As has been shown recently what we knew all along that News Corp. has a disregard for decency, truth and honesty.
Jeff, don't be a "useful idiot" regurgitating Glenn Beck's crazy talk. Start thinking for yourself.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
The Iodine Trade
Who would have thought that boring iodine would be in the news? But then a nuclear reactor throws out radioactive iodine-131 and suddenly everyone wants some. Why? Because saturating the thyroid with ordinary iodine prevents the take-up of radioactive iodine. Iodised salt is not much use for this as the iodine concentration is very low. It is only about four tablespoons of potassium iodate per tonne of salt and while this is is great against goitre it is useless against nuclear fallout.
Iodine was accidentally discovered in 1811 by Bernard Courtois, while trying to make gunpowder from seaweed. The antiseptic properties were used to save soldiers in the American civil war. Daguerre used it to make photographs. It was discovered by Chinese in 2700BC that seaweed could cure goitre, and in 1820 it was confirmed that iodine was the active ingredient. It used to be a way of life burning seaweed on the coasts of Ireland, Scotland and Brittany for the minerals needed by the alkali industry for fertilisers and the like. They would harvest the kelp, dry it and burn it, resulting in dense blocks of material ready to be shipped for processing. Gradually other sources were found that could be mined and the industry suffered. Iodine provided a valuable extra revenue that the kelp burners could earn but this was only temporary. When sodium iodate extracted as a by-product of saltpetre from Chile became available it threw thousands of crofters out of work and many were forced to emigrate. Nowadays iodine mainly comes from saltpetre and certain brine deposits.
Iodine was accidentally discovered in 1811 by Bernard Courtois, while trying to make gunpowder from seaweed. The antiseptic properties were used to save soldiers in the American civil war. Daguerre used it to make photographs. It was discovered by Chinese in 2700BC that seaweed could cure goitre, and in 1820 it was confirmed that iodine was the active ingredient. It used to be a way of life burning seaweed on the coasts of Ireland, Scotland and Brittany for the minerals needed by the alkali industry for fertilisers and the like. They would harvest the kelp, dry it and burn it, resulting in dense blocks of material ready to be shipped for processing. Gradually other sources were found that could be mined and the industry suffered. Iodine provided a valuable extra revenue that the kelp burners could earn but this was only temporary. When sodium iodate extracted as a by-product of saltpetre from Chile became available it threw thousands of crofters out of work and many were forced to emigrate. Nowadays iodine mainly comes from saltpetre and certain brine deposits.
Friday, March 4, 2011
Opus Energy Dodgy Trading
Opus Energy are in the business of hijacking companies' energy accounts . They will use some spurious reason to claim the contract for energy supply. Then they use every underhand and barely legal method to prevent you from escaping their grubby clutches.
Here is a six step list of how to escape from the misery of Opus Energy.
1) If Opus Energy cold call you and you aren't already signed up, DROP THE CALL IMMEDIATELY. The telephone sales people can not be trusted.
2) When they don't release your account (and they won't), open a formal complaint with Opus Energy and ask for a case number for the OFGEM ombudsman. Opus Energy will deny that they have a complaints procedure and case numbers don't even exist.
3) Contact your local MP and explain how Opus Energy are harming your business by charging excessive rates and trying to destroy your credit rating by sending spurious demands for unpaid bills.
4) Get onto Watchdog and see if that helps. Opus have been on there before so this might get a result.
5) Get onto the Police or Crimewatch if you think that Opus Energy used fraudulent methods to hijack your account.
6) If none of that works, then wind up your company and start a new one....in a new country.
Here is a six step list of how to escape from the misery of Opus Energy.
1) If Opus Energy cold call you and you aren't already signed up, DROP THE CALL IMMEDIATELY. The telephone sales people can not be trusted.
2) When they don't release your account (and they won't), open a formal complaint with Opus Energy and ask for a case number for the OFGEM ombudsman. Opus Energy will deny that they have a complaints procedure and case numbers don't even exist.
3) Contact your local MP and explain how Opus Energy are harming your business by charging excessive rates and trying to destroy your credit rating by sending spurious demands for unpaid bills.
4) Get onto Watchdog and see if that helps. Opus have been on there before so this might get a result.
5) Get onto the Police or Crimewatch if you think that Opus Energy used fraudulent methods to hijack your account.
6) If none of that works, then wind up your company and start a new one....in a new country.
Monday, February 21, 2011
Locking the debt ceiling
JeffK wants the USA government to limit taking on additional debt. He wants the government to stop spending money on these TLAs: EPA, DOE, USDA, DHS, BEA, BLM.
JeffK's article here.
Have you thought it through Jeff?
Without the EPA it would be a free for all to pollute the land.
Without the DOE doing planning, your future energy would be in doubt.
Without the USDA there would be no food standards. Who would stop somebody from adulterating food. Snake oil salesmen would make a comeback.
DHS. OK Jeff, you have a valid one there. While failing to catch terrorists it serves to inconvenience innocent people.
BEA: Somebody needs to monitor the economy.
BLM: Again, this manages the environment by controlling land use. Left to businessmen they would pulp the trees, rip coal from surface mines and what was left turned over to suburban housing.
Even the UN makes a valuable contribution to World peace but Jeff would abandon all these things. Apart from the DHS these are all agencies that make the country a better and safer place.
Why is there a huge debt anyway? Jeff blames it on the government which is sort of true. The government failed to regulate the banks properly. It was the banks playing Las Vegas with the economy and losing and requiring a huge injection of cash to stop the banking system from collapsing. Did any bankers get punished for destroying the economy? No (except for Bernard Madhoff). Put some of them in jail and see if they dare gamble again.
What ways could money be saved instead? Jeff mentions foreign aid and this is a more worthy target. A couple billion to Egypt? Oh dear. That doesn't look so wise now. And why does the USA give billions of dollars to Israel? Surely for that kind of money Obama could ask Israel to stop building on occupied land and make serious peace with the Palestinians? We had such high hopes for Obama. Instead he vetoes a UN resolution that would criticize the Israeli settlements. Also the many billions going down the drain to Iraq after a war that should never have been fought.
There is plenty that can be cut without cutting things that benefit the country.
JeffK's article here.
Have you thought it through Jeff?
Without the EPA it would be a free for all to pollute the land.
Without the DOE doing planning, your future energy would be in doubt.
Without the USDA there would be no food standards. Who would stop somebody from adulterating food. Snake oil salesmen would make a comeback.
DHS. OK Jeff, you have a valid one there. While failing to catch terrorists it serves to inconvenience innocent people.
BEA: Somebody needs to monitor the economy.
BLM: Again, this manages the environment by controlling land use. Left to businessmen they would pulp the trees, rip coal from surface mines and what was left turned over to suburban housing.
Even the UN makes a valuable contribution to World peace but Jeff would abandon all these things. Apart from the DHS these are all agencies that make the country a better and safer place.
Why is there a huge debt anyway? Jeff blames it on the government which is sort of true. The government failed to regulate the banks properly. It was the banks playing Las Vegas with the economy and losing and requiring a huge injection of cash to stop the banking system from collapsing. Did any bankers get punished for destroying the economy? No (except for Bernard Madhoff). Put some of them in jail and see if they dare gamble again.
What ways could money be saved instead? Jeff mentions foreign aid and this is a more worthy target. A couple billion to Egypt? Oh dear. That doesn't look so wise now. And why does the USA give billions of dollars to Israel? Surely for that kind of money Obama could ask Israel to stop building on occupied land and make serious peace with the Palestinians? We had such high hopes for Obama. Instead he vetoes a UN resolution that would criticize the Israeli settlements. Also the many billions going down the drain to Iraq after a war that should never have been fought.
There is plenty that can be cut without cutting things that benefit the country.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Alcohol and Firearms
In Georgia, Gov. Perdue signed a bill that allows people to carry concealed handguns in bars. Now what could possibly go wrong when you mix drunk people and guns? Is Roy Wetherington the only person to spot a possible problem with that? Tifton Gazette Opinion
Sunday, February 13, 2011
Then and Now - Cirencester
I remember a coach trip to Cirencester in the 1960s. It was an awful long way from London and we parked in the Forum. It was near the source of the Thames so why did we trawl the shops for an hour instead of going to see a muddy spring somewhere? I didn't quite get the point of going all that way for that but I was intrigued by the fact that even the most mundane wall was made of Cotswold stone instead of the bricks that I was used to. And 45 years later I find myself living down the road from Cirencester with an handful of transparencies from that era.
The Romans built the Tetbury road almost completely straight and so it stayed until the 20th century. Then an airfield cut it in two and the Cirencester end had a bypass built. The discarded fragment of the Tetbury road is still straight but doesn't go very far and used to look like this:
nowadays full of parked cars
The building at the end of the Roman road was the Petty Sessional Court and Police Station. By the time that Peter Coleman took the picture it was occupied by Avonprint.
Nowadays an estate agent for the wealthy.
Why did a busy town like Cirencester lose both of its railway stations? A lot of commuters end up having to go to Kemble to catch a London train. Here is the station probably having been closed a few years earlier.
And here is the station not changed much at all apart from the canopy being missing.
The Blue School on a bright summer morning.
Trees are trying to take over. Also we found that the road was really difficult to cross, being infested with many expensive German sports cars.
The plaque used to look like this
But it has been repainted with different text and it is very faded. In Feb 2011 the newspapers said that this building would be converted into flats.
The Romans built the Tetbury road almost completely straight and so it stayed until the 20th century. Then an airfield cut it in two and the Cirencester end had a bypass built. The discarded fragment of the Tetbury road is still straight but doesn't go very far and used to look like this:
 |
| From Box-G6 |
nowadays full of parked cars
 |
| From 2010-02-12Cirencester |
The building at the end of the Roman road was the Petty Sessional Court and Police Station. By the time that Peter Coleman took the picture it was occupied by Avonprint.
 |
| From G2721 |
Nowadays an estate agent for the wealthy.
 |
| From 2010-02-12Cirencester |
Why did a busy town like Cirencester lose both of its railway stations? A lot of commuters end up having to go to Kemble to catch a London train. Here is the station probably having been closed a few years earlier.
 |
| From Box-G6 |
And here is the station not changed much at all apart from the canopy being missing.
 |
| From 2010-02-12Cirencester |
The Blue School on a bright summer morning.
 |
| From Box-G6 |
Trees are trying to take over. Also we found that the road was really difficult to cross, being infested with many expensive German sports cars.
 |
| From 2010-02-12Cirencester |
The plaque used to look like this
 |
| From G2721 |
But it has been repainted with different text and it is very faded. In Feb 2011 the newspapers said that this building would be converted into flats.
 |
| From 2010-02-12Cirencester |
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Tifton
One feature of the the Tifton Gazette is the Rants and Raves section. Messages get posted without any form of identification As all comments are anonymous there are sometimes some rude ones. Take for example this one.
I can assure you that not all the people of Tifton are like this, my wife for one. Fortunately you can rely on people like Roy Wetherington for a broader outlook and common sense.
Small town
“You really don’t know how small Tifton, Ga., is until you get out of town. Closeminded town with closeminded people.”
I can assure you that not all the people of Tifton are like this, my wife for one. Fortunately you can rely on people like Roy Wetherington for a broader outlook and common sense.
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