U.S. Sending Some Detainees Away

The U.S. has rightfully received a lot of criticism for their treatment of detainees, and now they're shipping the prisoners elsewhere:

WASHINGTON, Aug. 5 (Xinhuanet) -- Facing with accusations of prisoner abuses from both home and abroad, the US government plans to transfer the majority of terror suspects in its custody to its allies, the Washington Post said here on Friday.

As part of the plan, nearly 70 percent of the detainees at the US detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, will be turned over to Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia and Yemen, the report said.

So the U.S. has problems with human rights abuses and the author of this article expects Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen to treat the prisoners better? I think sending anyone to either of those three countries is inherently a human rights abuse (okay, maybe that's an exaggeration). It actually doesn't seem that human rights abuses have anything to do with the government's decision to relocate its prisoners, but anyone who was appalled at the way that our country has treated its military prisoners should see the situation as worsening.

Matthew Waxman, deputy assistant secretary of defense for detainee affairs, says, "We, the U.S., don't want to be the world's jailer. We think a more prudent course is to shift that burden onto our coalition partners." By that, he means, "We, the U.S., are tired of people criticizing us for human rights abuses. We think a more prudent course is to avoid responsibility and ship out our prisoners to countries who will show the world what real human rights abuses are like."

The Bilderberg Group

Today someone told me about the Bilderberg Group, which I had never heard of, but it is apparently a group of very powerful individuals who meet yearly:

The Bilderberg group, an elite coterie of Western thinkers and power-brokers, has been accused of fixing the fate of the world behind closed doors. As the organisation marks its 50th anniversary, rumours are more rife than ever.

Some people are a little paranoid of them, but I'm not too worried, basically it seems that they just meet yearly to discuss the condition of the world economy. Anyway, I was just sharing that with you because I'm sure many of you were ignorant to their existence, as I was before today.

This summer ends soon

This summer ends soon. I'm ready for my last day of work, which is next Thursday. I'm kind of tired of this job; my co-workers have never really given me that much to do even though I've asked for things to do and I don't think I could have done much more to get myself more involved.

The day after my last day of work, I'm leaving on a trip to St. Louis with my girlfriend. She really wanted to go on a trip this summer and nobody else wanted to go, so it's just going to be her and me. Everyone is making a big deal about this, as if we've been going out for four years and are going on a trip just so we can have sex for the first time. Anything that might happen on this trip would have happened already, if it were going to happen. This is just a trip and there is nothing wrong with what we're doing, regardless of how things might seem or what you want to believe; there will be no sex on this trip. I don't believe I need to address any further concerns about this issue.

Anyway, the trip will be a lot of fun, I've never really been to St. Louis. We're also going to Little Rock, Arkansas on our way back, and it sounds like there will be a lot of cool stuff to do there as well. The day after we return from the trip, I will be moving into my dorm, and the day after that, I'll be starting school.

English textbooks discourage the enjoyment of English

I was never impressed with any of my high school textbooks. Here's an English teacher's perspective on the many problems that plague English textbooks and how those problems are turning students off to the subject. He says:

It's time for states and school districts to kick the mega-textbook habit that four or five big corporations control and start spending money on the kind of books that will make kids want to do sustained reading, to get lost in the written word.

I found the article very interesting and I believe that it's worth reading to get a better understanding of the problems that undermine education today.

Apple makes a multi-button mouse

Not that I ever use Apple computers, or have any reason to care whatsoever, but it seems to me that it's a good idea that Apple has finally made a mouse with more than just one button, I wonder why it took them so long to do it.

Coup d'etat in Mauritania

Mauritania has a new government:

A military junta overthrew Mauritania's U.S.-allied president while he was abroad Wednesday, prompting celebrations in this oil-rich Islamic nation that looked increasingly to the West amid alleged threats from al-Qaida linked militants.

The junta promised to yield to democratic rule within two years, but African leaders and the United States were quick to condemn the coup, declaring that the days of authoritarianism and military rule must end across the continent.

This doesn't seem too bad, since the authoritarian government will be replaced with a supposedly democratic government. However, I suppose it is possible that the U.S. could lose an ally in the war on terror, as the loosening of restrictions in Mauritania might include loosening of limitations on extremism and terrorism. The people in Mauritania seem to be happy though, so we'll see how it goes, I guess.

I like to learn and I've been learning

Lately, I've been very interested in learning things. I figure that now is a good time to gain knowledge because someday I might not have as much free time to learn and I my knowledge might be useful sometime. I have a lot of free time at work, so rather than waste my time playing games, I've been finding things to teach myself. For example, I've learned basically everything I know about investing while at work. I've also checked out some books from the library and have been learning on my free time at home. This summer, I've learned more about photography and I learned a little bit about XML. I bought a book about architecture and have been trying to teach myself more about it lately. I intend to learn more about philosophy sometime next year. Also, I'm hoping to learn some kind of programming - maybe PHP - so that I can do more neat things with my web site. I like to learn and I'm glad that I've been using my time productively to learn.

Comments exceed quota

A while ago I made a comments page that shows the most recent comments to my blog so that comments on old threads aren't missed by my regular readers. The page has been working rather well, but I just realized that there is a daily limit to the number of comments that can be added to the page and the excessive posting today has already exceeded the quota. So, anyway, I guess I'm going to keep the comments page, since it still works, but if the quota is reached a couple more times, I might end the comments page.

In short, nothing's going to happen now, I really do want good comments, but debating that induces excessive commenting in a short span might be thwarted. Also, does anyone ever visit the comments page?

Password expires soon but I don't care

I just got a notice at work that my password expires in 14 days. First of all, this is ridiculous because I don't need to prepare 14 days in advance for a password change. Secondly, this is annoying because every time I log on, I'm going to get an alert that my password expires. But, this is great because I'll be gone in 10 days so I can ignore these pesky messages and not bother changing my password.

Is this Swiss cheese?

I thought I knew what Swiss cheese is. However, lately I've noticed that some cheeses are being labeled as "Swiss" when they're not really what I understood to be Swiss. The first time I saw this softer cheese, without holes, labeled as Swiss, I thought it was a mistake, or even deception, but now that I have seen this cheese labeled as Swiss several times, I'm pretty confused. I don't think it's Swiss cheese, it almost seems like white American cheese, so why is it being labeled as Swiss cheese? Is there a big conspiracy in the food industry? I hope that someone can clarify this.

Photos from facility where I had to spend some time

Recently I visited a facility where I spent two of the most unpleasant years of my life. It was strange, my time there was so long ago that the memories in my mind were so old that it was almost as if I was visiting the scene of a movie that I had seen, not a place where I had spent so many days. Here is a view of the compound from the street:

Here is part of the side of the facility. There are security cameras like this all over the place. The fences on the roof are presumably to keep snipers from getting up there.

Side of building visible from the street, including the air conditioners and the towering incinerator chimney. Perhaps miscreants were burned in the incinerator before I went there.

Here's a rusted sign on the campus. You'd think they could afford to replace the sign after it became completely rusted.

Here's the back of the compound. To keep the place looking nice, they've painted the trash cans.

Here's the front of the facility. Yes, unbelievably it has windows without rusted metal mesh covers. Next to the windows are gray and malaise-inducing yellow panels to make the building look stylish.

This is what the depressingly dull-colored sign says in the picture above:

Yep, this is where I went to middle school. Here is the football blocking sled.

The building isn't so ugly because it's a penitentiary or anything, it's ugly because it's a modernist piece of crap. Here's the best that the architect could do for decoration:

It's not as if I went to a school in the ghetto, this school is actually in one of the nicer areas of town. Oh well, I guess the school is just as good looking as the students who go there.

Poll: Do you like to eat?

In general, do you like to eat?

Yes, few things are better in life
Yeah, eating's pretty good, I guess
Eating is okay
No, I don't really like to eat
No, that's why I have everything fed to me through this tube




Current Results

Create a FREE Alxnet Web Poll

Previous poll results (#52)

Most people said they trust their sense of sight more. Here are the results.

Hot dog eating competition

There are few places where you can work with people who participate in competitive eating, but today the department I used to work for had a hot dog eating competition. There were around 25 competitors (I was not one of them) and they all had 12 minutes to consume as many hot dogs and buns as possible. The competition was fierce, with several people eating more than 8 hot dogs. The winner ate 11 hot dogs and gained 4.6 pounds in the process.