Freedom

I think this is one of those things that all of us like to imagine we have. Everyone has different definitions of freedom. Some are people who want the freedom to be left alone, others are desiring freedom in a more highly defined set of "rights" such as we have in the US where it is our government's responsibility to monitor and regulate our free interactions with other people. But freedom can have lots of different impacts on our lives every day; I'm going to try and tie freedom into every news article I post here.

Starting with the Paraguayan indigenous population. Human protection groups claim that this people have never had contact with the outside world, even though we have photos of them. Ironic, right? They're not stupid. If they've had their photo taken (in the article), it's not like they haven't had contact or not understood that there is an outside world. So then now we have the debate. Are they supposed to be free to continue their existence in this part of the country? And what about our desire to conserve the habitat in this part of the world. This directly interferes with their free lifestyle, but in the end it's supposed to help them. Should we be intruding on their life at all? But isn't the reason the conservation project exists the fault of us, and we've already intruded on their freedom to choose their own lifestyles through this negative environmental impact?

Then we have the latest news on the gulf oil spill and who's being blamed for it. It's strange in a world so big, we've been able to come up with controls and responsibility for what happens offshore in the water. And in my personal opinion, they should lose their freedom to operate oil rigs if they can't just shape up, take responsibility, clean up their mess and not do this again.

New art is being displayed in Germany, after being discovered during new construction projects. It was hidden by the NAZI regime, a perfect example of super-conservative and misguided restriction of freedom. I can't honestly say that I think any of the art was really worth saving if not for posterity's sake, but still, it's something new to look at and talk about in Germany.

In a country often criticized for lack of freedom, new talks are scheduled to take place to attempt to fix the economic problem. Cuba has never been known for holding party meetings and discussing issues, but more for blindly following its leadership. It would seem that there is hope for what we here would call "progress" towards a less strict communist state. Sometimes though it seems like that is more idealistic than practical towards improving the welfare of a people.

All of these articles target the discussion of freedom in a different way; all of them are from the news today. Freedom is such a catch-phrase, and yet a critical desire in everyone. It's just that we all imagine varying degrees and extents of freedom. Sometime I'll tell you what freedom means to me specifically, but today I just wanted to provoke some thought.

Just sitting

This morning we had harvest for 30 pigs here on campus. While this overlapped with my 11 am class that I would've been occupied by otherwise, it also took up a lot of my morning considering that we started at 6.00 am this morning. I like getting up early in the morning and my time working odd hours with Marcus was amazing. But what you have to do in that case is find a time for a warm afternoon catnap. What I don't like is the long day without any kind of rest. My new plan for this afternoon was to take a nap, but my position as a TA in a 2.30 recitation won out and I will be headed to the class shortly. If any of you expect to find me this evening, you will find me back here at Animal Sciences helping host the Fayette County 4-H group as they come in for a carcass show regarding the animals they had us harvest on Tuesday.

Speaking of 2 harvests in the same week I am sharply reminded of something my dad said a couple of years ago. I often have these sudden and short-lived urges to work out and build up my muscles. Exercise in the form of walking, running, basketball and biking are things that I have no trouble picking up at any time or getting into the habit of doing. However, in the case of actual muscle building, I usually don't last a week. Well, a couple of years ago Dad made the comment that some of the strongest people arre those that work in a slaughter facility or as butchers. He claimed this was because of the workload and how it was also built around a week so that different muscle exercise was performed each day.

Now that I am aching all over from the second harvest in a week, I am realizing just how right he was. The work that we do, even when I'm only moving carcasses down the rail (pushing or pulling weight) is very taxing and I am not in the kind of shape that I should be in to do this twice in a week. Tuesday was difficult, but the repeat on Thursday has pushed my muscles to a point where they complain to me when I try to drink a bottle of water. This is hard work, and good work. When I was asked today by one of the grad students today if this was what I thought I'd be doing in my Masters program, I said "Yes." I am learning new things every day and starting to fit into the work so that I don't feel uncomfortably out of place every day now. It's good to be challenged again, both physically and mentally.

Although my commentary on the following links will be limited, they are totally worth the viewing. Check them out and have a great day!

First off, if you know anything about Google maps, you've probably tried creeping on your house and seeing what you were doing when they took the image for their website. If you haven't, just take my word for it that they are real photos and I can even tell when they update them because the model or position of cars will change at our house. Well, apparently in Brazil, the images were banned after this happened.


Hungary continues to pollute the earth, even as we're still trying to sort out who we really are going to get away with scapegoating for the BP spill.

Finally, in case you haven't heard it often enough in recent news, here's the Daily Show's take on the non-witch GOP candidate.

I love Pandora radio and my ACDC channel has been one of the best choices I've made regarding my homework and project productivity.

Roma and BP

"Dags? You like dags?" "Sure I do, but I like caravans more." If you can't name the movie, you should watch it. Snatch is great scrubby British movie with good humour, cheap actors and a stupid plot line. Yet, it has its own good lines primarily because there is some realism to the movie characters. Anyhow, if you have't seen, you should, and then you'll have a different picture in your mind when you read this post.

The Roma (gypsies) are being given the boot from France now and there is debate as to whether or not this is legal. I also saw some reading on their story when I was in Cork where they complained about the abuse of the "wanderers". These people are despised and kicked out of everywhere and they just can't seem to catch a break. Think what you will because I will not judge or make comparisons to other recent culture-related issues similar to this. What's really important here is just to watch and see how this all pans out with France and EU. I'm against these people getting singled out and kicked out of the country, but if the government wants to do it legally according to the EU, then who's to stop them?

Before we move on to BP, I just want to give props to Obama for his take on the Iranian human rights abuse. Now if he can just not back down, that'd be even better.

BP. Well, there were 2 stories floating around the BBC today, of contrasting types of morals exhibited by the huge oil company. First, they have allegedly pulled the political string and requested the release of a Libyan terrorist in order to promote their oil "exploration" efforts in Libya. Nice job guys, we'll see how that turns out.

Secondly, they have appointed a new safety division in their worldwide corporation which will supposedly have large amounts of power. In my opinion, safety inspections and regulations only work as well as they are enforced and audited. Hopefully they put people in this "powerful" division that can really get the job done and prevent more employee accidents and deaths while also preserving what's left of the Gulf Coast and other parts of our world.

BP stocks, anyone?

So I've been thinking recently. With that BP guy fired and the environmental disaster on its way to recovery, now is the perfect time to buy into BP stocks. They're bound to go up now, assuming that they can once again convince people not to hate them and to buy their gas. Anyhow, I'm including the stock report for your own information - make up your own mind as the next months progress. Amanda's not the same kind of risk taker that I am, so we'll be putting money in the banks instead.

My thoughts on BP.

Brits are complaining amidst calls in US for BP to stop paying dividends until they can prove that they have enough cash to pay for their clean-up. Just in case you were wondering if the company would go under... yes, I think that would probably be easier, and less environmentally responsible. But then again, it's hard to tell if they care that much about that anyhow.

New estimates for past flow indicate that BP vastly underestimated the extent of the damage they created in terms of spilled oil. It's absolutely incredible how stupid this corporation full of MBAs and Engineers can make themselves sound right now. I don't wish for BP to go under, because I know people who work for them, but I sure as hell believe they ought to pay every cent it takes to clean up the mess they've made as well as can be done. And to those Brits complaining about your pensions... get over it. This world is cruel and you should sit down and wait for your turn after this mess is cleaned up. Or buy a lot of BP gas, since their revenue directly impacts your income. It's not that I don't care about you, I just want you to get grip on how huge this thing is, or how little attention has been paid to the BP workers who died, or how many other people's entire lives have been destroyed by this.


Also, in case you were wondering, I have inserted the BP plan for collecting oil. Apparently it has been moderately successful, capturing about 50% of oil that spills every day. How long until we get the other 50%? Talk from BP says August. Great. Alternatively, if we ever wanted to compete with the Sun, we could just light the Gulf of Mexico on fire and see how it feels about it's new sibling.

On totally different news - I was in Cuidad Juarez and continue to be surprised about all that happens there, or that we ever visited there for a mission trip. Crazy stuff...

And I have finally uploaded a picture of the bike.

Colbert's BP update

I just want to congratulate Colbert on another great show. I am so angry about this whole BP thing, and he captures both my sarcasm and anger about the issue. And if it's true that Bing supported environmental recovery by brand name mentioning, thanks to you as well.