On December 3, 1981, an anti-authoritarian countercultural collective’s one-ring circus was performing in a Jesuit college prep’s parking lot as a group of us handed out copies of the second issue of an underground student newspaper, The Third Degree. 3-D for short, its first issue had been handed out 17 days earlier without any bylines, and none of us had gotten into any trouble. That didn’t quite hold for this second issue, though not for a reason you might expect. ...
On pp. 6-7 of Jan Harold Brunvand’s The Choking Doberman and Other “New” Urban Legends (1984, W.W. Norton & Company), he writes that “the earliest reliably dated complete American version” of the story he has found comes from the 24 June 1981 issue of Phoenix’s New Times (by Dewey Webb, though Brunvand doesn’t mention the byline): GAGGING DOG STORY BAFFLES POLICE It happened in Las Vegas. A woman returned from work and found her large dog, a Doberman, lying on the floor gasping for air. Concerned over the animal’s welfare, she immediately loaded the pet into her car and drove him to a veterinarian. ...
My friend Steve introduced me to punk rock in the early 1980s, and I went to a few shows and picked up flyers and copies of The Gagging Dog punk zine. This represents a very thin slice of Phoenix punk history, with a few non-punk inclusions towards the end. The flyers aren’t a good representation of my experience, since I usually picked up flyers at shows but then didn’t go to the shows advertised in those flyers, with some exceptions (e.g., the first two flyers were for the first two shows I did attend, and the Siouxsie flyer was advertising a film she was in and was given out at her show). ...
ChatGPT does fairly well with this, though its selected points don't include any of the more obscure points of interest, it's skewed to the popular highlights. Its claim that there weren't any historic crossings is pretty odd. What are some of the most beautiful and interesting locations in the Grand Canyon along the Colorado River?ChatGPTThe Grand Canyon offers numerous beautiful and interesting locations along the Colorado River. Here are some notable ones: ...
Not much blogging going on here still, but here's my annual list of books read for 2019. Graham T. Allison, Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides's Trap? Ross Anderson, Security Engineering (3rd edition, draft chapters) Herbert Asbury, The Barbary Coast: An Informal History of the San Francisco Underworld Heidi Blake, From Russia with Blood: The Kremlin's Ruthless Assassination Program and Vladimir Putin's Secret War on the West Rutger Bregman, Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World Oliver Bullough, Moneyland: The Inside Story of the Crooks and Kleptocrats Who Rule the World Bryan Caplan and Zach Weinersmith, Open Borders: The Science and Ethics of Immigration C.J. Chivers, The Fighters: Americans in Combat Sefton Delmer, Black Boomerang Nina J. Easton, Gang of Five: Leaders at the Center of the Conservative Crusade (bio of Bill Kristol, Ralph Reed, Clint Bolick, Grover Norquist, and David McIntosh) Ronan Farrow, Catch and Kill: Lies, Spies, and a Conspiracy to Protect Predators Ronan Farrow, War on Peace: The End of Diplomacy and the Decline of American Influence Ian Frisch, Magic is Dead: My Journey into the World's Most Secretive Society of Magicians Anand Giridharadas, Winners Take All: The Elite Charade of Changing the World Reba Wells Grandrud, Sunnyslope (Images of America series) Andy Greenberg, Sandworm: A New Era of Cyberwar and the Hunt for the Kremlin's Most Dangerous Hackers Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey, She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement Stephen Kinzer, Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change From Hawaii to Iraq Michael Lewis, Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt Jonathan Lusthaus, Industry of Anonymity: Inside the Business of Cybercrime Ben MacIntyre, A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal Joseph Menn, Cult of the Dead Cow: How the Original Hacking Supergroup Might Just Save the World Anna Merlan, Republic of Lies: American Conspiracy Theorists and Their Surprising Rise to Power Jefferson Morley, Our Man in Mexico: Winston Scott and the Hidden History of the CIA Sarah T. Roberts, Behind the Screen: Content Moderation in the Shadows of Social Media Hans Rosling, with Ola Rosling and Anna Rosling Rönnlund, Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World--and Why Things Are Better Than You Think Russell Shorto, Amsterdam: A History of the World's Most Liberal City Alexander Stille, The Sack of Rome: Media + Money + Celebrity = Power = Silvio Berlusconi Jamie Susskind, Future Politics: Living Together in a World Transformed by Tech Erik Van De Sandt, Deviant Security: The Technical Computer Security Practices of Cyber Criminals (Ph.D. thesis) Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff Tim Wu, The Attention Merchants: The Epic Scramble to Get Inside Our Heads Top for 2019: Bullough, Farrow (Catch and Kill), Wu, Chivers, Rosling, Greenberg, Blake, Allison, Caplan and Weinersmith, Kinzer, Delmer. I started the following books I expect to finish in early 2020: Myke Cole, Legion versus Phalanx: The Epic Struggle for Infantry Supremacy in the Ancient World Walter LaFeber, Inevitable Revolutions: The United States in Central America (2nd edition) Brad Smith and Carol Anne Browne, Tools and Weapons: The Promise and Peril of the Digital Age Peter H. Wilson, The Holy Roman Empire: A Thousand Years of Europe's History Two books I preordered and look forward to reading in 2020: Anna Wiener, Uncanny Valley: A Memoir (due out January 14) Thomas Rid, Active Measures: The Secret History of Disinformation and Political Warfare (due out April 21) (Previously: 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010, 2009, 2008, 2007, 2006, 2005.)
From John Keeling, by way of the May 2019 Fortean Times (p. 28): In 1945 a jittery American public was mistaking Venus for Japan’s FU-GO balloon bombs on an alarmingly regular basis. 9,000 of the 30 ft balloons with incendiary bomb payloads had been launched against the US in the hope of causing large-scale forest fires and spreading terror....On June 6th, Phoenix and several other Arizona communities had their first ‘Jap balloon’ panic. Telephone lines to the press, police department, sheriff’s office and weather bureau were reportedly jammed....Luke Field and Williams Field fliers, checking the object from planes, were able to report back definitely that there was no balloon where reported. And Phoenix Junior college’s 5 inch refractor telescope clearly identified the object as Venus. According to the Associated Press, Tucson had the same experience, with Davis-Monthan fliers being ‘sent to cut down the invader.’
I received the following spam email today (a link on the email claims, falsely, that I opted in for it in October 2013) from the Christine Jones for governor campaign. Jones is a former GoDaddy executive who looks like a terrible candidate for governor of Arizona. Dear James, As a Republican candidate for Governor, I am frequently asked where I stand on the issues important to our state-issues ranging from immigration and education to economic development and healthcare. At a recent forum I was asked one of the single-most important questions that a candidate for political office can face. The question was, "Where does your moral compass come from?" At three years old, I climbed onto the Sunday School bus that drove the neighborhood kids to the local evangelical church. It was there that I learned about God and His Son, Jesus. Since then, I have let my personal relationship with Him be my moral compass. One of my life phrases is, "Do the right thing because it's the right thing to do." I am not interested in making excuses or politicizing important issues. I am interested in doing things based on conviction and personal belief. As Governor, I can promise you that I will adhere to my moral compass. If you would like to hear more about my story and why I am running for Governor, I invite you to join me Tuesday, April 29th, from 6:30-8:00pm at New Life Community Church of the Nazarene in Show Low. I hope you can make it! Best, Jones for Governor, Inc · Primary PO Box 13087 Phoenix, AZ 85002-3087, United States ...
I have just a few more weeks (until July 31st) to reach my fundraising goal. Please donate any amount you can - just as RESCUE saves one life at a time, we reach our goal one dollar at a time. If you are unable to make a donation, please reach out to another animal loving friend, family member or co-worker and ask them to support our efforts. Just this morning Maricopa County Animal Care & Control announced that: ...
Below these two videos is a post I made (perhaps to the Kate Bush fans’ “love-hounds” mailing list, I don’t recall) back in 1986 regarding a 1985 Christian “rock music seminar” about alleged Satanic backwards messages in rock music. I was familiar with the claims of supposed “backwards masking” where the sounds of ordinary lyrics were interpreted to have different messages when reversed, as well as actual examples of recordings that were put into songs in reverse. The former seemed to me to be examples of subjective validation, and I tested it myself by closing my eyes and covering my ears when the presenter gave their claims about what we were supposed to hear prior to playing the samples. Subsequently, this became one of the first tests the Phoenix Skeptics conducted as a student group at Arizona State University in October 1985. We invited the speaker to give his demonstrations before our group, but required him to play the samples first without explanation and have everyone write down what they heard. The result was that on the first pass, those unfamiliar with the samples had a wide variety of responses; on a second pass, once the expectation was set, everybody heard what they were supposed to hear. It’s interesting that this demonstration, the key example of which was a sample from Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven,” made a comeback two decades later–being used by skeptics to show the power of suggestion and expectation, as these two videos from Simon Singh and Michael Shermer demonstrate. Simon Singh, 2006: ...
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ CD8) was shot this morning at an event at a Tucson grocery store, along with several other people. The Tucson Citizen reports that she was “shot point blank in the head." This brings to mind a previous gun incident at another Tucson event at a grocery store in August 2009. The image below is from Sarah Palin’s website, “Take Back the 20." The lower right target sight image on Arizona is Congressional District 8, which was one of the “targets” for candidates who supported the Health Care Reform bill to be defeated. ...