Au Revoir Jeanne Claude

Christo was never far from Jeanne Claude and she was the bull dog getting the projects done.
With "The Gates" we may have seen the last of the great Christo projects.

The Death Penalty Experiment Has Failed

In Callins v. Collins, Feb. 22, 1994 Justice Blackmun wrote;

“From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death. For more than 20 years I have endeavored...to develop...rules that would lend more than the mere appearance of fairness to the death penalty endeavor...Rather than continue to coddle the court's delusion that the desired level of fairness has been achieved...I feel...obligated simply to concede that the death penalty experiment has failed. It is virtually self-evident to me now that no combination of procedural rules or substantive regulations ever can save the death penalty from its inherent constitutional deficiencies... Perhaps one day this court will develop procedural rules or verbal formulas that actually will provide consistency, fairness and reliability in a capital-sentencing scheme. I am not optimistic that such a day will come. I am more optimistic, though, that this court eventually will conclude that the effort to eliminate arbitrariness while preserving fairness 'in the infliction of [death] is so plainly doomed to failure that it and the death penalty must be abandoned altogether.”


President Obama will have two more opportunities to keep the extreme right wing activist justices in check.

Flatbush Artists Studio Tour: the video

Another plus for this great neighborhood.

Man on Wire

Just watched “Man on Wire”.

Philippe Petit walking between the World Trade Center Towers.

I’m sure he was/is a pain but the film was touching.

No mention of the end of the towers but 9/11 is the silent partner to this film.

When he finally steps out … Well watch it and you tell me.

...The First One Now...

...Will Later Be Last...

Mary Travers 1936-2009

"The sharpest criticism often goes hand in hand with the deepest idealism and love of country."
~Robert Kennedy

Bambi meets Godzilla

Just because

Souter’s First

In June of last year I wrote;

“John McCain has stated he continue to appoint conservative judges. The more moderate, some say liberal, judges are ready to retire. John Paul Stevens is 88, Justice Ruth Bader-Ginsburg is in her middle 70’s and has health issues and Justice Souter would like to get back to his cabin.
All of them are clinging to their seats, praying for a progressive, Democratic President so they can retire and not concede the court to the activist right.”

Well Souter has bailed and you have to know that Ginsberg and Stevens are not far behind.
Elected by Papa Bush Souter ended up being a judge that understands the law and was not an ideologue. The Shrub’s choices are a disaster that we will have to live with for a long time.
Thankfully all three made it to Obama’s Presidency and he will have the opportunity to at least keep the jackals at bay.

The Thinnest of Margins

It has been awhile since I wrote about ecology and I totally missed Earth Day.

To make up for it I will quote Garrett Riesman
an astronaut that I have been fortunate to meet. Upon getting to the Space Station and looking back at Earth he said this;

“…the thing that was closer to an epiphany for me was at one point I looked out, was within a day or so of being in orbit, I looked at the horizon, and I could see how thin the atmosphere was. And the atmosphere was... it just was the thinnest sliver of a band around the earth. And if you look, one would describe this as if you hold your arm out at full-arm's length, and I think if you stick out your pinky [finger] basically, that's the thickness of the atmosphere as seen on the horizon from our altitude. That's really not much, and it looked incredibly fragile. Before this, I kind of thought of the skies and seas as these vast, limitless expanses, and I don't think of it that way anymore. Especially when you consider how thin the atmosphere is and when you consider the ocean is a tenth as a... you know, ten times as less thick as the atmosphere is. You get the feeling that everything that we think as being Earth, all the forests, oceans, trees, and mountains. All that stuff is just the thinnest little coating on the top of a gigantic rock.”

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Tharon Musser 1925-2009

Tharon Musser represents the change from old theatricals to modern stage design.
Most significant was her work on “A Chorus Line” that brought her love of dance and use of new technology to Broadway. Her proudest moment may have been “A Little Night Music” where all her skills came into play and culminated in a beautiful design that served the script.
The NY Times has printed an obituary that gives her great credit for her work.
My life changed one morning in Dallas where I was having breakfast with Tharon and Marilyn. I had planned to find a regional theatre and enjoy the craft. Tharon set me on another path.
Through a friend of hers I found myself on the way to Stratford Conn. and the Shakespeare Festival where she had deigned some of their biggest productions. From there it was just a short drive to New York.
Tharon kept me busy as an assistant until I was able to get out on my own and eventually she became my landlady.
I enjoyed 25 years in that household and was privileged to be able to call her a friend.
Her illness took her away from us way too early she will be missed.

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A Billion!

There are a lot of "billions" being thrown about these days. But how much is a billion?

Isn't a million pretty big?

Lets look at in terms of time.

To calculate the number of years in one billion seconds, write first one billion in integers to make sure you don't miss any zero i.e 1,000,000,000.

Next, we determine how many seconds are there in a year:
1 min = 60 seconds
1 hour = 60 min = 60 x 60 seconds = 3,600 seconds
1 day = 24 hours = 24 x 3,600 seconds = 86,400 seconds
1 year = 365 days = 365 x 86,400 seconds = 31,536,000 seconds

To get the number of years for 1,000,000,000 seconds, we just divide
1,000,000,000 by 31,536,000

It should give us : 1,000,000,000 / 31,536,000 = 31.71 YEARS.

To give you an idea a million seconds is just about 12 DAYS!

70 Years Ago Today

Marion Anderson, banned from singing at the Constitution Hall by the DAR, sang at the Lincoln Memorial in front of 75 thousand people including the young Martin Luther King.

30 Years Ago Today

3 Mile Island went critical and the nations nuclear industry stopped cold.

Just the week before I had seen "The China Syndrome".
It was like "deja vu all over again.

30 Years Ago Today
3 Mile Island

The Perfect

Bicycle accessory.



C'Mon Spring!

Stupid Groundhog!

Thanks to VeloNews for the image.

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It Was Always...

About the Supremes.

With Ginsburg ill, Stevens is 88 and Souter wanting to reteat to his cabin Obama will appoint at least three supremes soon.

Size #10

Iraqi journalist throws shoes at George Bush. Apparently it is an insult to throw shoes in Iraq.
I'm afraid the Shrub will not catch a break in his last days a Commander in Chief.

67 Years Ago

But just a thought...

This is the fiftieth anniversary of the peace sign, originally designed as the official sign for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament in England in 1958.

PEACE

BREATHE !!!

You can hear Justice Stevens

let out a sigh of relief now that President Elect Obama has been elected.
This election was always about the Supreme Court.

President Elect Obama will have the opportunity to keep the Supreme Court somewhat in balance for the future. He will probably appoint three justices before he’s done.

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Again the New Yorker says it all in a simple image.