Archive for September, 2006

loose change

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon this film called “Loose Change”. I dare not call it a documentary since a documentary is defined as: based on or re-creating an actual event, era, life story, etc., that purports to be factually accurate and contains no fictional elements. I had thought about blogging after I watched it, but to be honest, I didn’t want to even dignify it with a response…it was just completely ridiculous. However, since then I’ve heard of people who have seen it and actually believe the lies, so here I am. For those of you unfamiliar with the film, basically it is a hodgepodge of conspiracy theories in regards to the government’s involvement with 9/11. Essentially it makes the case (albeit a weak one) that the US government was behind everything.

Now I could go point by point and debunk the whole thing, since practically nothing in it is based on fact, but there are plenty of other sites that do that (links at the bottom) So, I’m going to just point out the major logical flaws.

1. If it was true, the film makers would be dead. - If the US government would actually plan such a horrific event, spend billions upon billions of dollars, and kill thousands of innocent Americans don’t you think they would actually want to keep it covered up? Have you never seen the movie “Pelican Brief” or “Conspiracy Theory”? If “Loose Change” was true, I think they would probably have killed the film makers long ago (they first started on the story in 2002).

2. Nothing like 9/11 has ever happened before. The movie spends a majority of the time trying to explain the reasoning behind why the towers collapsed that day but the closest thing they could find to compare was back in 1945 when a B-25 (they lied and said it was a B-52) hit the Empire State Building. FYI- A B-25 weighs 1/10th that of a 737, goes half the speed (max), and carries 1/35th the fuel. So how does that compare exactly? There is nothing, NOTHING that compared with the impact on that day…and besides, unless you’re a structural engineer, stop pretending like you know more than the experts.

3. What did we gain? Just looking around on the internet a bit and you can read that 9/11 cost around $500 billion…that doesn’t count the war that has followed. Overall, probably closer to $1 trillion. Oh, but we did it for the oil right? Not even close…if Iraq cranks it out they might be able to export $5 billion a year, in addition to their pre-existing commitments and after they pay off the debts to other countries. So, in about 200 years we’ll break even! Even in the brightest, most optimistic outlook there is no way that the financial cost was worth it.

So those are 3 major logical points to debunk the whole thing, in addition to all of the others which are outlined in the links below.

Don’t believe everything you see.

Internet Detectives
9/11 Myths
Screw Loose Change
Wikipedia - Loose Change
Debunking 9/11

why i hate digg.

Three months ago if you asked me about digg.com I would have sang it’s praises. I would have told you about how it’s one of my favorite sites and that it puts all other tech-news sites to shame. well…it’s not 3 months ago and sadly, things have changed.

They released digg 3.0 a couple months ago which was basically just some nice eye-candy and some new topic categories. This in turn, opened up a lot of social, political, and religious discussion in the comment section. should be a good thing right? um, no. Here’s what I don’t like:

#1 digg is filled with 14-30 year old men dominantly who like to talk about how great they are and bash pretty much everyone else. there’s no balance, no tact, nothing.

#2 it’s supposed to be democratic, but it’s not. If you state a comment or post a story that someone doesn’t agree with, it gets buried (censorship anyone?)…so more and more we see only one side of the political, social, and religious spectrum.

#3 90% of all the “news” that comes across the wire is just regurgitated headlines from other sites…by the time it gets to digg, I’ve probably already read it somewhere else…if it is original or new information, it’s literally a race to see who can post it first and get as many diggs as possible before the other guy (usually the underdog) does.

I did a quick search on Google and it seems that I’m not the only one. http://www.google.com/search?q=hate+digg

mysecret.tv

One of the blogs that I read regularly pointed me to this relatively new site called mysecret.tv. The idea is that people come to the site and anonymously share some sin in their life (a lot like postsecret). The page reads:

Why you are here
It’s been eating at you.
It keeps you up at night.
It’s too big to keep in.
Too big to tell.
It’s just time to get it out.
And get on with it.
What’s your “it”?

Of course posting our secrets on a webpage isn’t going to save us from anything…but their (as well as my own) hope and prayer is that sins will not only be confessed to others anonymously, but that the sin will be confessed to God.

It’s an interesting idea.

The thing that really struck me, was that after reading just a handful of them I started to get a picture of just how much sin hurts us…how much the devil tempts us all. So many people have thrown their lives away because of some addiction, so many marriages are falling apart because of distrust, so many are struggling because they just don’t feel loved anymore. There’s just so much hurt in this world… and seeing this site, makes me realize that not only are those people out there hurting, but also that they need someone to share that pain with or otherwise they wouldn’t be saying anything at all.

So…I guess my prayer is that those people who are hurting would find a place where they are loved…where they can share their struggles and pain…where they will be forgiven.

So let it be.

us open.

I like tennis. I don’t know why…it’s not exactly a little person friendly sport. I guess it’s just something I grew up around. I’ve been watching the US Open on the USA Network. I’ve watched just about every year for as long as I can remember. Usually I don’t get to watch that much, but this year I’ve caught several matches…I don’t really have a favorite player, so I’m not really following anyone, just watching in general. Roddick is great server and seems like a decent guy, but he seems a little cocky and stubborn…and his backhand could use some work. Agassi was great, but he got old and slow (and retired). Maria Sharpova is fun to watch, but she’s not a very mature player…so yeah…I don’t really care who wins…I’m just enjoying the show.

You should check it out if you have the chance…semi finals are starting in the next couple days.