Obama collecting personal data for a secret race database

From NYPost.com (July 18):

A key part of President Obama’s legacy will be the fed’s unprecedented collection of sensitive data on Americans by race. The government is prying into our most personal information at the most local levels, all for the purpose of “racial and economic justice.”

Unbeknown to most Americans, Obama’s racial bean counters are furiously mining data on their health, home loans, credit cards, places of work, neighborhoods, even how their kids are disciplined in school — all to document “inequalities” between minorities and whites.

This Orwellian-style stockpile of statistics includes a vast and permanent network of discrimination databases, which Obama already is using to make “disparate impact” cases against: banks that don’t make enough prime loans to minorities; schools that suspend too many blacks; cities that don’t offer enough Section 8 and other low-income housing for minorities; and employers who turn down African-Americans for jobs due to criminal backgrounds.

Big Brother Barack wants the databases operational before he leaves office, and much of the data in them will be posted online.  [read more]

Great more databases that hackers can break into. You know those databases won’t be secure. If you didn’t catch it, I said databases. According to the article, there are five collection of databases all related to race: Housing, mortgage, credit-card transactions, employment and finally school. Yes, that’s right big brother wants to know about your kids.

What? No database about guns? I guess the regime doesn’t care if minorities have guns or not. Notice that the databases don’t include stats about gender. Hmm…

These databases just like any created bureaucracy will still be in existence long after the Emperor is out of office.

Obama’s Newest Gun Control Scheme Involves Social Security Benefits

From The LaTimes.com (July 18):

Seeking tighter controls over firearm purchases, the Obama administration is pushing to ban Social Security beneficiaries from owning guns if they lack the mental capacity to manage their own affairs, a move that could affect millions whose monthly disability payments are handled by others.

The push is intended to bring the Social Security Administration in line with laws regulating who gets reported to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, or NICS, which is used to prevent gun sales to felons, drug addicts, immigrants in the country illegally and others.

A potentially large group within Social Security are people who, in the language of federal gun laws, are unable to manage their own affairs due to "marked subnormal intelligence, or mental illness, incompetency, condition, or disease."  [read more]

Well, Congress can’t manage the financial affairs of the country (they can’t control their spending), and Obama can’t manage foreign affairs maybe they shouldn't be allowed to own guns either. This is just a war on the disabled and veterans.

The Safety Truck Could Revolutionize Road Safety

From global.Samsungtomorrow.com (June 18):

Have you ever found yourself driving behind a semi-trailer truck? If you’re on a single-lane highway or road, it can be a nightmare. Even though the truck is driving relatively slowly, you cannot overtake it due to its size, and because you cannot see what is happening in front of the truck.

However, Samsung has developed a solution that may make this problem a thing of the past.

How Does it Work?

The Safety Truck consists of a wireless camera attached to the front of the truck, which is connected to a video wall made out of four exterior monitors located on the back of the truck. The monitors give drivers behind the truck a view of what is going on ahead, even in the dark of night.  [read more]

Cool. Hope it does prevent accidents. But how would the truck driver open up the back of the truck without breaking the monitors unless they are really durable. Probably made of some tough plastic material.

'Mini ice age' coming in next fifteen years

From Independent.co.UK (July 12):

There will be a "mini ice age" in 2030, solar scientists have said.

We are now able to predict solar cycles with far greater accuracy than ever before thanks to a new model which shows irregularities in the sun’s 11-year heartbeat.

The model shows that solar activity will fall by 60 per cent between 2030 and 2040 causing a "mini ice age".

The conditions predicted have not been experienced since the last "mini ice age" which lasted from 1645 to 1715, called the Maunder Minimum. [read more]

What happened to global warming or its new name ‘climate change?’ Oh, that’s right. It’s a hoax. I mean if climate change computer models never use the sun as a factor to calculate global temperature something is not right. I mean the sun is the main factor in the equation! Or it should be. Look at the dwarf (shouldn’t that be little person?) planet Pluto. Since it is farthest from the sun it can be as cold as -387 degrees Fahrenheit. The warmest it can be is -369 degrees Fahrenheit when it’s closest to the sun. Oh by the way, Pluto has methane (a green-house gas) in its atmosphere. Someone tell Al Gore so he can lecture the Plutonians about creating Plutonian-made climate change.

So, a ten year range is now considered ‘mini?’ That’s seems more like major or semi-major to me. And the Left will still find a way to blame people using too much green-house gases for the ice age.

I always thought the sun has a role in any global climate. It just makes sense.

The New Totalitarians Are Here

From The Federalist.com (July 6):

There’s a basic difference in the traditions of political science between “authoritarians” and “totalitarians.” People throw both of these words around, but as is so often the case, they’re using words they may not always understand. They have real meaning, however, and the difference between them is important.

Simply put, authoritarians merely want obedience, while totalitarians, whose rule is rooted in an ideology, want obedience and conversion. Authoritarians are a dime a dozen; totalitarians are rare.  The authoritarians are the guys in charge who want to stay in charge, and don’t much care about you, or what you’re doing, so long as you stay out of their way. They are the jefe and his thugs in a brutal regime that want you to shut up, go to work, and look the other way when your loudmouthed neighbor gets his lights punched out by goons in black jackets. Live or die. It’s all the same to the regime.

Totalitarians are a different breed. These are the people who have a plan, who think they see the future more clearly than you or who are convinced they grasp reality in a way that you do not. They don’t serve themselves—or, they don’t serve themselves exclusively—they serve History, or The People, or The Idea, or some other ideological totem that justifies their actions. [read more]

In the past the totalitarians, were the Communists, the Fascists,and the Nazis. Kings and emperors were for the most part authoritarians.

Now, you have the far Left ideology and Muslim theocracies like Iran. Although the Ottoman Empire was a Muslim theocracy in the past. It’s basically what ISIS wants to recreate.

Socialists have always been around.

Cults are totalitarians in principle.

The big difference between authoritarians and totalitarians is the latter have manifestos to spell out their grand vision and philosophy of life. Marx, Mao, and Hitler had manifestos. Cult leaders have manifestos. Jim Jones was a Communist. The Progressives manifesto is the Humanist Manifesto. It’s the manifesto that the totalitarians want people to believe with their hearts and minds. In certain totalitarian societies the leader wants to be omnipotent and omniscience. In other words, God-like.

New Alzheimer’s treatment fully restores memory function

From Science Alert.com (Mar. 18):

Australian researchers have come up with a non-invasive ultrasound technology that clears the brain of neurotoxic amyloid plaques - structures that are responsible for memory loss and a decline in cognitive function in Alzheimer’s patients.

If a person has Alzheimer’s disease, it’s usually the result of a build-up of two types of lesions - amyloid plaques, and neurofibrillary tangles. Amyloid plaques sit between the neurons and end up as dense clusters of beta-amyloid molecules, a sticky type of protein that clumps together and forms plaques.

Neurofibrillary tangles are found inside the neurons of the brain, and they’re caused by defective tau proteins that clump up into a thick, insoluble mass. This causes tiny filaments called microtubules to get all twisted, which disrupts the transportation of essential materials such as nutrients and organelles along them, just like when you twist up the vacuum cleaner tube. [read more]

Sounds promising. The article states that of the mice that received the treatment, 75 percent got their memory function back. That’s quite a bit.

Progressive Educational Philosophy

For John Dewey, there are three aspects to human nature: instinct, habit, and intelligence.

John Dewey believed that education is the deliberate process by which human beings take responsibility for their future.

John Dewey argued that it is not possible for principles or ideals to attain eternal and unchanging authority.

In the Progressive educational program, the social and political ideal is both cause and effect of what takes place in the classroom.

Historicism posits that any understanding of the true and the good is a product of prevailing circumstances.

Dr. Fennell notes that in the Progressive school, teachers leave education to chance.

The success of the Progressive school consists explicitly in the extinction of the conservative [my emphasis] mind.

William Kilpatrick, a protégé of John Dewey, believed that mathematics education should focus on direct practical value.

According to Dr. Treloar, the new math movement never grounded itself in concrete mathematics at an early grade.

Grammar is considered impractical according to the Progressive philosophy of education.

One problem with grammar instruction today is that grammar is taught implicitly and quickly.

Modern education policy views the study of science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) as a pathway to jobs for the 21st century.

Source: A Proper Understanding of K-12 Education: Theory and Practice online course from Hillsdale College.

Classical Education Philosophy

Reading instruction begins as soon as a child is born.

Cursive writing instruction is beneficial to the student in that it improves fine motor skills, increases writing speed, and gives the student a chance to create something beautiful.

Dr. Coupland notes that if a child has had a wonderful language-rich experience, they should be ready to learn how to read by the time they get to kindergarten.

Dr. Calvert argues that, first and foremost, parents should be teaching students the stories of the past.

Classical education values knowledge for its own sake.

The study of science should be placed in historical context because it's a human endeavor.

Learning about science is part of what elevates students to self-government.

When science is studied properly, students begin to see that the universe is orderly, complicated, and intelligible.

Since antiquity, grammar has been viewed as one of the foundational liberal arts.

Dr. Jackson notes that teaching literature properly will shape a student’s habit of mind.

When students open a great book and study it seriously, they will grapple with philosophical ideas, learn something about themselves, encounter theological ideas.

In order to teach literature well, teachers must dedicate themselves to reading the texts along with their students.

To read well, students must be able to employ both listening and contemplation.

The fundamentals of writing include logic, organization, and focus.

After returning graded papers, teachers should help guide students in reflecting on grading comments.

To improve writing, teachers should help students find a crux for their papers.

Teachers should remember that the main goal of writing education is to get students to undertake the writing process.

Dr. Garnjobst notes that the chief reason for studying Latin is to engage in a conversation with the great thinkers of the Western tradition.

Source: A Proper Understanding of K–12 Education: Theory and Practice online course by Hillsdale College.

Happy Birthday, America!

So, then, to every man his chance -- to every man, regardless of his birth, his shining golden opportunity -- to every man his right to live, to work, to be himself, to become whatever his manhood and his vision can combine to make him -- this, seeker, is the promise of America.
        - Thomas Wolfe

The American Trinity by Dennis Prager. The American Trinity is: E Pluribus Unum, In God We Trust, and Liberty.

Driven from every other corner of the earth, freedom of thought and the right of private judgment in matters of conscience, direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum. – Samuel Adams

May the foundation of our new constitution, be justice, Truth and Righteousness. Like the wise Mans house may it be founded upon those Rocks and then neither storms or tempests will overthrow it. – Abigail Adams

I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation’s destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost. - Frederick Douglass

The happy union of these states is a wonder; their Constitution a miracle; their example the hope of liberty throughout the world.  - James Madison

Scientists Develop Self-Healing Airplane Wing

From IFLScience.com (June 25):

We’ve already had self-healing concrete, now welcome to the world of self-healing airplane wings. After having worked quietly on the project for the past three years, a team of British scientists has now announced a new carbon fiber technology that, when damaged, can fix itself.

Drawing inspiration from how the body heals wounds, the idea started as all good ones do: as a doodle on the back on an envelope. Since then, the team of researchers at the University of Bristol has been working with aerospace engineers to develop the material. The product they've come up with is able to patch over small, almost undetectable cracks in the wings of planes. The new technology represents an important step in self-healing products becoming more commonplace, with possible uses in bike frames, sports equipment, and even cracked smartphone screens.

It works in a similar way to the aforementioned concrete, with the carbon fiber material being infused with microbeads so small they look like dust to the human eye. But rather than filling the spheres with microbes, they contain a liquid healing agent which, when released during damage, reacts with a catalyst and consequently hardens. How long the setting process takes, however, depends on temperature. So cracks in the wing of a plane in Dubai might harden in hours compared to one in Reykjavik that could take days, according to the researchers.  [read more]

Interesting. If scientists can do this on airplanes why not cars? If a car gets scratched then it can make the scratch go away. Maybe even make small dents disappear too.

Didn’t evil androids on the Terminator movie have this ability?