slapdummy

Comical confessions of an economic rube

I just finished John Perkin's book "Confessions of an Economic Hitman" and I don't know whether to react with "duh!" or with something a little more cogent. It will probably be a bit of both, so please bear with me.

This is a tell-all book of his work to manipulate nations. His mandate was to create or leverage circumstances that would make these countries economically dependent which in turn made them pliable to political influences.  These machinations were designed to create opportunities for Western governments to push their own economically and politically advantageous agendas often to the detriment of the target country. Think of it as the Jedi mind trick gone global ("You don't really want to privatize that industry, do you?" - cue gentle hand waving).

Again, I'm finding it really hard to not react with a typical "AND...?" This doesn't shock or unsettle me in today's world. In fact, I would have been surprised if this hadn't been occurring. Maybe this would have been more disturbing if it was the year 1968.

Beyond the conspiracy theories surrounding the World Bank, economic exploitation and manipulation have been in the negotiation toolbox for a long time. Both during and after the cold war it was recognized that the fight against communism (or any "ism" for that matter) was as much an economic fight as a political or security action in nature. Historians such as Walter LaFeber and William Williams viewed our efforts as straightforward expansions of the American empire via color TVs and Levi's. In short, the U.S. was engaged to either create or maintain access to markets for our currency, goods and services. Hegemony, thy name is dollar.

Although I do have to admit to not being particularly thrilled with the author.  Perkins makes significant attempts to address his efforts as merely the unseemly results of his seduction.  He uses that phrase and idea many times, both in his book and in his interviews. My problem is that for as often as he informs the reader of how smart and aware he is, he also attempts to paint a picture of how he was "trapped". His uninspired confessions to his acts are laughable, bordering on smarmy and self-serving (which is funny how almost everyone who does a tell-all book sees the "truth" just in time for publishing in 52 media markets and 17 languages).

I'm not sure I would recommend this book to anyone, unless they had just left a desert island after 60 years. So, unless another Japanese soldier emerges from hiding soon, I would leave this one on the shelf and just pay attention to CNN and Haliburton.

To coup or not to coup

You've gotta love Thailand...

Hey, It's a coup

Just kidding, it's a "troop rotation". Nothing to see here, move on.

Okay, seriously, it's a coup.

No really, it's just a coup, get back to work already.

And just to make sure the important coup news is covered:

Nick Cage's movie is continuing

CD-R supply not affected

Another good gathering

I was at a small gathering of friends for a birthday party last night and one friend brought his new girlfriend. She seemed pleasant enough, until the conversation turned to homosexuals and their apparent transgressions against her personal views on society.

I'm still not sure how the conversation started, but if I remember correctly another person started saying something about how he didn't like "the gays" flaunting their sexuality in his face.  I reminded him that some gay folks probably feel the same about seeing overly sexual public acts of hetero affection ("the straights").  A side note worth mentioning here is that the host (and one of my dearest friends) is Mormon. He has specific views about religion, homosexuality and other things that we don't usually get into discussions about. We agree to disagree one some topics, although I know he isn't some freak fundamentalist that has a hatred hard-on for gay people. In a scenario where somebody, straight or gay, is doing some overly public display of affection, he would be equally annoyed.

Anyway, from the flaunting discussion this new girlfriend added something about gay pride parades and how she didn't understand why they were necessary. Again, I pointed out that there were many groups that have unity or pride parades and in the case of gay people specifically, not only were they for a celebratory recognition, but they raise awareness for some of their grievances.

Unfortunately, the reaction I got first was outright disbelief ("what are they not getting now?") and what I like to call "the tone".  Now, I'm a rational guy and willing to discuss and/or debate on a variety of topics and I can even allow for people who don't agree with me. But when people whip out the condescending tone as though it strengthens their argument, that's usually when I start to get ramped up.

When I listed issues such as their lack of equal access to marriage and legal recognition in some states, her response was "They can't pro-create, so why should they be able to get married?". She's a mother of three and living at home with her mom (I learned this later and the irony of which was beautiful) and was talking like she would to one of her children, not to mention her juvenile and woefully inadequate argument all combined to really annoy me. My response was the obvious one for her statement; plenty of people get married with no intention of having children should they be barred from getting married in the first place? And, by the way, there are plenty of folks who are infertile, should they too be banned from getting married or treated any differently?  I also didn't add the obvious that they actually can pro-create because I thought it seemed too complex for her to understand the distinction.

The boyfriend defused the situation before it really ramped up with a perfect amount of humor and all was "good". I apologized to my host later for creating an uncomfortable situation, to which he just laughed and told me that it wasn't even worth talking about.

Yeah, I realize that all of this is my own version of condescension, but for fuck's sake if you are going to pop off to somebody you just met, whip out the childish tone and have a weak-ass argument, then you might be better off just shutting the fuck up, sing "Happy Birthday" and eat your slice of cake. But, hey, that's just me.

Happy Slots

While on my layover in Vegas this weekend I popped in $20 to the Wheel of Fortune slots machine. Within a couple of rounds I had spun my way to $90. I played a bit longer and cashed out ahead by $67.50 beyond my original twenty. I'm a happy guy.

However, I didn't do as well as another waiting passenger. When our flight was delayed again and we had a gate change, she put in two quarters and won several hundred. Now she was happy about winning, but was also bummed that she had not put in that third quarter which would have bumped her winnings into the thousands. Instead of being happy at winning a good chunk of change on $.50, she was only thinking about the "loss" of the other money. I wonder what lesson she learned today (if any) and if she will only max out her bets from now on when she plays?

UT Football Fans

I'm not  sports fan, however I am sometimes fascinated by the spectacle. As I was waiting to board my flight home I couldn't help but notice how hardcore Austin is about football. There is a big game tonight between UT and Ohio, but you would think it was the Superbowl with the degree of presence. People disembarking were, with one exception, wearing UT clothing of some sort (bless the pretty girls with two sizes too small football shirts). Passengers were cheering each other on with giddy excitement. The exception I noted earlier... he was wearing an Ohio jersey. However, it was from the marching band, which was somewhat brave but also ranks high on the geek scale. In other words, buddyroe was asking for a punch in the head from some UT fan.

I was told by the hotel valet that 40,000 fans were coming in for the game. I thought he was exaggerating a bit, but everywhere I looked people were decked out in their game attire. The local media were also playing it up with constant coverage and special countdown clocks (as though any of these super fans wouldn't know).

The airport has huge signs welcoming their football fans (I wonder if they switch the signs out for other sports, or if the iconography of Friday Night Lights is alive and well in Austin - which begs questions of the story itself).

Seattle has the UW Huskies but rarely do I see this level of open enthusiasm for the team. The big game is tonight, probably under way or even over by the time this is posted. However, I still can't bring myself to care that much about what's happening to try and watch the game.

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I wrote this on the plane yesterday with the hope to post it on the way home in the taxi. However, my HTC Hermes apparently isn't properly setup for data transmission. Also, I thought what the hell and checked the score just now - Texas lost 24-7.

Austin Four

My last full day in Austin and the last day of the Austin Games Conference is today and I'm not too sad to see it be done and over with. I took the shots with the camera on my phone, so they didn't turn out very well. Although I had some interesting moments worth remembering:

• Having some yipping bastich of a dog barking most of the night in the hotel. Apparently, they allow pets for an extra fee - how nice for them.
• Discovering a locally branded bottled water - Ozarka.  It must be a regional thing down here, because when I first saw that all I could think of was hillbillies marrying their sisters. I was actually hesitant to drink it at first, but it was the only cold bottled water they gave us in the booth.
• Having more goth and stoned people than I care to count come up and say "Hey, I'm making a game, when can I get it published?".  I wanted to respond, "Hey, have you ever published a game before or did you just come up with an idea between layers of mascara and expect us to give you cash today?" (which I didn't, of course).

• Survey Boy - I got roped into a focus group for a potential product from Seagate, the hard-drive manufacturer. They apparently are investigating becoming some sort of service for digital objects and characters. It sounded like a mediocre bordering on bad idea. And they paid me, and a bunch of others, $200 to tell them so.

• Ozone Days - While this may sound like some sort of Eco-event, it's actually a warning to the city of Austin to stay indoors whenever possible because the pollution is considerably higher than normal.  When this happens they run the city buses for free. Apparently the buses have been running free for a couple of weeks. Combine this with 90 degree weather and it's more fun than any one person deserves.

I have to admit that this is one the most laid back conferences I've ever been to in terms of number of attendees, general attitude and shock and awe.  The entire exhibition floor was the size of just the Microsoft or Sony booth at E3. The noise level was next to nothing, I could actually hear people talking in a normal tone of voice, which is virtually unheard of at these shows.

My biggest regret is not making it to the County Line BBQ place with my friend.  Through a comedy of errors (and a miscommunication between the words lunch and dinner), I bailed on my team dinner to go to County Line BBQ only to have my friend cancel with me and make it his "company" event. I got to see him later that night to catch up and he had the audacity to tell me how good the food was at the restaurant. Bastard.

I catch my flight home tomorrow and after a brief layover in Las Vegas (with just enough time to lose some money in the slot machines), I'll be home again, home again jiggity jigg.

Austin Two

I'm on day two in Austin and I've spent most of last night and all of today in my hotel room. I have items to do tomorrow and Friday that require my presence at the Austin Games Conference, but until then I'm trying to get some other items finished. I missed the Pardo keynote, but I'm okay with that as I'm making progress on tasks that have been lingering for far too long.  For instance, I'm trying to determine if a new business can be self-funded with projected earnings or if it's going to be a money pit - good times.

On a side note, the hotel isn't bad. It's not great, but it's not bad.  I've learned it is the oldest hotel in Austin and one of the oldest buildings in town. I'm not surprised by that. They have obviously kept the place up and it looks nice, but it also has the cramped feeling of older structures.  The elevator was smaller than my TV, no really it is.  The room service is about what you expect, not horrible but not great. However, I do have to admit that they make a damn fine jalapeno corn muffin that I wouldn't mind eating eight...uh...again.

Another nice aspect of being in the hotel room, I I've had the chance to catch up on some free movies while working courtesy of HBO.  So far I've seen:

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - I love Tim Burton, so I've been looking forward to this for a while.  It was very damn cool. Depp came off as a creepy guy, the kids and their parents were suitably obnoxious and the story was fun (although I missed about 15 minutes of the end when my girlfriend called). Yeah, it's a remake, but at least it had quirky style. "You shouldn't mumble, I swear I can't understand a word you're saying!"

Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit - I don't think I've been a huge fan of this series, but I'm now a convert. This was damn funny and it was compelling enough that it made a difficult time of concentrating on my work (which ended up being abandoned for the duration of the movie). I need to check out some of the other shows as well.

Matchstick Men - This was a pretty good diversion. I was interested in seeing what happened, but didn't pull me into it.  At least not until the end, which I found to be both entertaining and sad. I don't want to give it away, but dang that was a bit harsh.

I found out last night that my friend, who is also in town for the conference, was nice enough to rent a car. The plan is to hit County Line BBQ before we leave, hopefully that will happen since he is busier than I am nowadays.

Heading to Austin

I haven't been to Austin in more than a decade and the last time was to see a friend (who as an aside that I also haven't seen in a very long time).  I thought Austin was similar to Seattle in the bars and music scene, however I wasn't that crazy about the heat or the Congress Avenue Bridge bats. Yes, yes the bats are nice to the environment by munching on insects and whatever, but damn, seeing that black mass of bats was creepy (hopefully I'll have a chance to see it again considering I'm a glutton for punishment).

I'm heading to Austin for the Austin Games Conference next week on another work trip. I'm not exactly excited about the heat, projected to be in the mid-to-high 80s but at least everything down there has air conditioning. All of these game conferences are usually the same thing, repackaged again and again, with a few exceptions. I've never been to this particular one, but I'm not expecting much.  There are some guest speakers that may be interesting, such as Rob Pardo. I've had some friends try and push Vernor Vinge (who is also speaking at Austin) on me before, especially "A Fire Upon the Deep". I tried, I really tried reading it and I couldn't even force myself to finish half of it. Let me put it this way - I'm bitter, because I can't get that time back.

One nice part about the trip is the hotel - The Driskill. While I've learned that hotel's don't usually live up to their hype (the Hyatt Century Plaza in L.A., for example), but I'm hoping this one is decent. I also don't have to share a room on this trip, which by itself is lovely. I've also been told that while I'm in Austin, I must visit "The County Line BBQ", which looks great.

The plane ride is going to suck a bit since it's wheels up at 7:30am and I will have to plan for extra security time fun, but at least I already have my bag packed and all my back-up extra devices are powered up, software loaded and good to go if needed.

Crikey indeed

I always thought Steve Irwin was interesting and irritating at the same time, his schtick didn't get any better when he did that extremely questionable trick with his kid.  He always seemed to take unnecessary risks (almost showy), so I don't think anybody hearing about his death today by stingray is going to be very surprised. However, I do feel bad for his family.

Link: CNN.com - Stingray kills 'Crocodile Hunter' - Sep 4, 2006.