Inventor Thomas Edison captured the event on film. He would release it later that year under the title Electrocuting an Elephant. A means of killing initially discussed was hanging. However, the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals protested and other ways were considered. Edison then suggested electrocution with alternating current, which had been used for the execution of humans since 1890

Topsy was fed carrots laced with 460 grams of potassium cyanide before the deadly current from a 6,600-volt AC source was sent coursing through her body. She was dead in seconds. The event was witnessed by an estimated 1,500 people and Edison’s film of the event was seen by audiences throughout the United States.

When Luna Park burned down in 1944, the fire was referred to as “Topsy’s Revenge”

Article From Wired

The dying art of sending messages with hidden messages in the mail by unique stamp fixation.

This a was a worldwide craze but most of the rules seem to have been written up by French and Belgian People. Apparently it’s all in the angle. There’s a great collection of literature and “how to’s” from around the world (meaning old europe) regarding use of stamp communication here.

Being Dependent upon things we don’t understand is nothing new.

It’s only what we are dependent upon that changes.

We used to depend on gods to bring the meat and potatoes.

Today we depend on virtual widgets collecting wireless data from weather satellites that predict the probability of rain.

1. Increasing complexity does not necessarily imply progress

2. Often complexity is unnecessary, and when it is, you can bet someone is gaining from it.

If we were all more selective with our complexities, we would be in a much better predicament.

————————————————

At MIT, Paul Griffith wrote a thesis entitled “self replicating machines”, a clever idea taken from nature.

in nature, it was the ribozyme that was believed to be the springboard to all self-replicating life. Imagine a string of data that can copy itself. And then… complexity and possibility.

Anyway back to Paul Griffith, in a recent interview, the guardian newspaper tried to nail down exactly how much energy the internet as a machine was consuming. The best estimates from independent studies is that the internet uses 1-3% of total world energy consumption.

Paul scoffed at the idea, noting all the complexities and externalities that don’t get included in the count. Says he, “Part of the reason humanity is in the situation it is with climate change is that we weren’t measuring how we were using energy and understanding the consequences.”

Notice he says humanity, not life…. life will be just fine.

This film is an “in”credible series of intricate floor shows tied together with bright colors and an amazing fireplace.

• the cast of characters are a super human bunch
• able to telepathically “whip up” a routine in the blink of an eye
• the whole country is at their fingertips
• and the christmas-eve-summer-camp-variety-show at the lodge is just around the corner

THESE ARE THE FILMS THAT CONVEYED AMERICAN IDEALISM

AND INTERPRETED WHAT THAT WAS SUPPOSED TO BE

• Everyone has a perfect memory
• Everyday is a physical and spiritual preparation for the next party
• Old Generals wear leather jackets
• Horseshoes is a sport for the dying
• and the weather is governed by song

_______________________________

America does so well in the movies

As the hermit kingdom of North Korea faces its great crisis since the invention of the hamburger. We consider another land who strove to maintain a  self imposed quarantine amidst world affairs,  Albania.

Socialism in Albania was written and directed by Enver Hoxha. The script was considered by Albanians to be the the only “true”  legitimate socialism (anti-revisionist Marxist Leninism). By declaring themselves the real deal, they closed themselves off from even the staunchest of hardline communists. USSR- washed up, Yugoslavia- sellouts, China- Mao was cool for a while but in the end, they also were considered sellouts.

What resulted is incredibly weird, tragic, unique and amazing. Being self sufficient requires a hard line, a strong sense of identity and the will of the people. When you don’t have all that to go on, you create myths and build huge electric fences… that’s exactly what Enver Hoxha did. The myths of identity linking Albanians to the ancient Illyrian civilization is more “Little House on the Balkan Prarie” than truth, but in the hearts and minds of Albanians, they are the legitimate heirs to this culture. Their DNA suggest otherwise.

The video collection below are parts of series that you can follow on the youtube. There is another, you can dig for from 1989 in German discussing how all churches and mosques were converted into museums and cinemas. I find it interesting that the solution Hoxha gives for a mixed bag of religious denominations is to Atheize them into unity.

But first some background about why I decided to write on Lothair….

“Lothar of the Hill people” is an old SNL skit based upon “Lothar of the hand people”, a band of mad dwarves that packed in their synthesizers and took electropop country to the people. Just listen

All that to say “Lothar of the hand people” got me wondering about the original Lothar and how he must’ve handled himself. Actually I thought Lothar might be a good name for a dog and then I “suddenly remembered my Charlemagne”

Once upon a time in the 9th Century there was a European Union Called the Carolingian Empire. It ran from pink to yellow.

The whole thing was ultimately set up by Charlemagne, King of the Franks. Charlemagne was actually Belgian but since we all know Belgium isn’t a real country, we’ll call him what everyone else called him, Charlemagne (Karl= old man + magne= the great). Even today the root “kral” or king comes from the old man’s name. Here you see Charlemagne’s tag as you would find it marking his land and stuff.

Like all Belgian kings of note, Charlemagne spent much of his reign expanding and consolidating his empire. Managing it would be something else. After Charlemagne died, His 3 grandsons were put in charge of the kingdom, according to the color coded map above.

Louis the German got yellow,

Charles the Bald got Pink,

and Lothair I got green.

Lothair’s empire was Lothringen which is today known as Lorraine, an area much sought after in wars through to wwii.

Louis set up Germany, Charles the Bald founded France, but Lothair…. could never get the love from his other two brothers and he ended up brokering a weak peace agreement and leaving his share of the union to HIS three sons.

Son 1 took Nothern Italy, Son 2 Provence and Son 3 (Lothair II) got Lotharingia

There is no Lotharingia today because Lothair II couldn’t get a legitimate heir to the throne. He only produced a bastard child named Hugh to run what is now the Benelux region. But because he was such a bastard, Hugh had his eyes gouged out by Charles the Fat (a son of Louis the German) and things disentigrated from there.

Bottom Line: The empire is always pissed away in a peter principled way when the children come to rule what they themselves never grasped.

Get to know the Cathars, the cause for the first inquisition in the 12th century. They appear to have a gnostic, anarcho-christian-buddo-daoist take on life. They have been the source of a lot of curiosity over the centuries, mostly because of their violent suppression by the church and perhaps because they had some secrets to keep. Otto Rahn, the sheepish and eccentric expert on the Cathars was convinced they had the grail. So convinced was Rahn that the SS made him chief of archeology and gave him funding to find it. He didn’t. Instead he died alone in a forest.

The Cathars believed in light. A spark of divine light that existed in mankind. This light, or spirit, had fallen into captivity within a realm of corruption identified with the physical body and world. Their goal was liberation from the realm of limitation and corruption identified with material existence.

The path to liberation first required an awakening to the intrinsic corruption of the medieval “consensus reality”, including its ecclesiastical, dogmatic and social structures. Once cognizant of the grim existential reality of human existence (the “prison” of matter), the path to spiritual liberation became obvious: matter’s enslaving bonds must be broken. This was a step-by-step process, accomplished in different measures by each individual. The Cathars accepted the idea of reincarnation. Those who were unable to achieve liberation during their current mortal journey would return another time to continue the struggle for perfection. Thus, it should be understood that being reincarnated was neither inevitable nor desirable, and that it occurred because not all humans could break the enthralling chains of matter within a single lifetime

There is no “Welcome to Catharism” website because nearly all of them were killed or psyched out in the Albigensian Crusade.

It is widely held in the Cathar region of Southern France to this day that the escapees took with them le tresor cathar. What this treasure consisted of has been a matter of considerable speculation.

“Look around—there’s only one thing of danger for you here—poetry.” P.N. Sept.1973

On September 11, 1973 there was a coup in Santiago. An elected official and his band of socially high minded poet lefties were abruptly relieved of duty in a Butch and Sundance shootout at the Chilean Central Corral. Pablo Neruda dies of a broken soul.

You know the story, Henry Kissinger has another one of his great ideas that to better Merica’s interests in South Merica, we should install strong arms that will deliver copper and cheap labor on time and on our terms. Operation Condor was an elective surgery that went terribly wrong and left lasting injuries.

One of the side effects was the murder of journalist Charles Horman. He was following up on the links between the CIA and Pinochet, real journalism. Charles was died and his family received somebody else’s body to grieve on. There was even a movie made about the whole thing. Jack Lemmon got the golden palm for his part.

But the film wasn’t released as planned, US ambassador Davis sued Universal for 150 million and the settlement didn’t allow for stateside release until 2006. Meanwhile Charles Horman’s body is missing along with hundreds of others. He may still be in the stadium, he may be in the South Pacific food chain.

Now a judge is asking questions.

“Your mind has the capacity to invent
imaginary worlds,
making them so real
that they become real.”

The modern use of the word MAGIC
is a semantic bastard
compared to what it once was…

an all inclusive psycho-social paradigm
tinged with sex
that motivated, manipulated…
governed society
as it still does
under a different heading

Act I
the purveyor of these arts
was the magician, the alchemist, the astrologer.

each knew that memory…
the limits of memory
were the boundaries of imagination,
the playground.
this was the realm of his powers
his narrative
his playground

Act II
Enter the reformation
enter the suppression of imagery
and the beginnings of
matter of fact
and new masters
of science and technology
and the divine

*The life and death of Ioan Culiano are as mystical as his writings:
He spends his whole life
writing on magic
and the corruption of the Romanian state.
He develops a method for creating a photographic memory.

He then dies in a University of Chicago bathroom stall
a gunshot to the head.
His files are missing.

what if the russians actually won the cold war…

not the soviets as the soviets, but a small fragment within the goverment that continued on in it’s mission
even to this day

i got to thinking on the plane  about how some russians are so incredibly smart…
like genius buddha aspergers smart.
so why was it they were always behind
ok not always behind
but atleast not always on the ball, not too motivated
in developing better nukes and bombers?
oh sure,
they lifted a finger when they had to,
but maybe their tactics didn’t match the West’s

What if they were playing according to a different playbook
What if they were following the Sun Tzu approach
…
the wise ruler avoids warfare altogether
…

undermine and destabilize your opponent not by your own force, but their’s

if you can identify the flaws and weaknesses in your opponent
then all you do is facilitate your opponent’s implementation of those weaknesses
to the point that your opponent seals his own demise

what if the kgb or some more specific unit within the soviet system was working to this end?
they saw the problems that arise with personal freedom, the limitations of true equality…

i.e. they saw all the potential for hypocrisy inherent in the western system and decided to capitalize.
they pushed here and there to promote these flaws to the point that the overall structure slowly began to fall apart,
meanwhile no one was paying attention… after all the west won.

nobody thought anymore about it.
but what if the cold war isn’t really over?

I think Mr. Mayer should have a dignified sendoff… Something respectful and tasteful… Something with Mariah Carey and the wienermobile; maybe they could just leave things set up in the Staples Center. What more for the man who was able to turn inards into an empire; and an automobile into a hot dog.

Robert Strange McNamara died in his sleep this morning. A peaceful end for the 93 year old Master of War who tried to rationally streamline violence, warfare and the American automobile. He never dropped a bomb or fired a gun, but he could annihilate whole cities with his slide ruler and pen. The firebombing of Tokyo (seen above), the body counts of Vietnam, and the Ford Falcon were all brainchildren of Master Robert. Good night Shiva.

It’s important to note that prior to all the bombing and postwar hindsight, McNamara was hailed as the “whiz” kid that scored highest on the standardized tests and processed information better than a computer. Trouble was he had no moral intelligence- winning and losing had nothing to do with right and wrong. I wonder how much we’ve learned

The Fog of War (2003) is an in depth discussion with McNamara where he nurembergs himself out of culpability by reasoning that he’s learned a lot of lessons. Highlights include scuttling the Domino theory and a mea culpa long gaze when Errol Morris asks him if he considers himself a War Criminal. In McNamara’s defense, he is possibly one of the only wartime architects to enter the house of Empire and to ever come close to apologizing for his errors. Once you get in, the machine tends to eat you.

Check out these brainiacs. A lot of Physics was discussed in 1911, with and without mustaches. I bet Dr. Jeans (#11) got made fun of for not bringing his facial hair to the table. Madame Curie got some jibes too, but then she probably threatened to ionize anyone that crossed her. Mr. Perrin (#21) has read the same sentence 5 times and still doesn’t get it.

Quantum Physics is a great conversation icebreaker because it’s something we all share and yet don’t understand. On the other hand, homelessness is the exact opposite. It’s definitely not as standardized as physics or coca-cola. If given the choice, I’d prefer a vagrant’s life in Honolulu to down and out Belarusian destitution.

And so it goes. Two homeless homies from San Mateo, California are finally having their day in a court”house” after getting into a heated and violent discussion about quantum physics and the splitting of atoms.

On March 30th, 2009, Jason Everett Keller apparently took up arms against one Stephan Fava during a routine-homeless-guy-discussion about the nature of the universe. For reasons unknown, Fava was lambasted with a skateboard across the face that left him with a split lip and a deeper understanding of intra-nukular forces.

(via appletree)

Russian leadership succession follows a very specific pattern: Hairy guy, bald guy, hairy guy, bald guy….

This goes back to the time of Alexander I, who was both hairy and bald

Smoke on the water. The French generals take bad cues and strike at the wrong time, the lines are broken and Napoleon is getting a stomachache. Before word of victory reaches the Duke of Wellington, The Rothschild observer on the ground, a man named Rothworth, has already sent word back to England. Nathan Mayer Rothschild, knowing that everyone on the trading floor is watching him (their courier lines were the best of the best), begins to sell English bonds called “consuls” as if Napoleon has won. Everyone else soon follows and the conclusion that the English have lost begins to take root in everyone’s gut. The price of consuls bottoms out, and THEN Rothschild has his men begin buying back quietly. By the time Wellington’s courier’s arrive and confirm victory, Rothschild is in position to control the Bank of England.

So monkeys officially glow now and of course the next logical question is where do we go from here? One possibility is to cure diseases and know ourselves more fully and, of course, the other is to complete the work of people like Dr. Mengele and Dr. Ishi of unit 731 by proxy- to know for the sake of knowing, manipulate, exploit however we please because yes we can (as long as it’s not human).

I don’t think glowing monkeys have a habitat outside of a lab. There was Neverland ranch, but even that’s gone. Bubbles, Michael Jackson’s famed chimp has been placed on suicide watch after the Bankruptcy-Bahrain-Child-Molestation-rhinoplasty debacle(s). The history of hominid experimentation has definitely been a very bumpy journey. In 1961, NASA sent chimp #65 into space. The Russians had already done the mammalian thing. Laika (Лайка) the dog, a russian mutt, was the first creature with tits in space. Sadly Laika didn’t make it home alive. It was never part of the plan.  She did however make it onto a couple of Cold War era stamps where she is portrayed enjoying her blowout.

Chimp #65 was a bit more complicated. He originally came from Cameroon and had to be convinced that space travel was in his best interest. This was done with the aid of xanax coated banana pellets and mild electric shock. (Photo below of #65 thinking over his options- go up in rocket or more taser and waterboarding.) Lucky for #65, the von Braun rocket did work and he floated back to earth in restrained comfort. NASA didn’t name him Ham until he returned safely from his trip, you know how those things play out in the press, remember Laika? Giving an animal a name only makes things more complicated. Ham spent the rest of  his years in a zoo trying to open the escape hatch. He died in 1983, not glowing.

You’ve heard of Al Gore’s “Current TV” staffers Euna Lee and Laura Ling. They are currently bound up in North Korea where Juche justice has just meted out a sentence of 12 years in a labor camp: Re-education, friday beatings, and working in a coal mine that may serve as a new launch shaft for some ballistic missiles. No kimbap.

Crossing a border illegally is a touchy subject, just ask the Von Trapp family. Word on the street says Al Gore may be packing his handbags and preparing a low-footprint rescue mission. Careful Al, better pack the heat. Funny how their cameraman Mitch Koss, got away. If anyone is in the Bay area, you might look him up and ask what exactly happened and WHY the girls were carrying their ID?

Of course these women are not the first uninvited guests to venture too far into “No Man’s Rand”. There was James Joseph Dresnok, the US soldier who lost it one day in 1962 and kamikazily crossed a mine field to become North Korea’s prized white guy. He didn’t take his passport. Apart from developing his smoking and drinking skills over the years, Dresnok’s also dabbled in Communist re-education and acting; however Pyongyang’s burgeoning film scene has stunted his growth as a performer. Dresnok has definitely created a type cast for himself- the American bad guy.

The most bizarre entry to date, however, is the story of Evan C. Hunziker. This tale is worthy of another look, maybe a made-for-TV movie or at least a docudrama re-enactment with shadowy narration by people in the know. 26 year old Hunziker is an enigma inside a jelly roll. Here’s why….

It begins in Washington where Evan is born to a no-nonsense American veteran of the Korean War and a Korean mom. Growing up is tough. There’s authority issues. There’s relationship issues. There’s a move to Alaska. There’s restraining orders and pencil stabbings…. then a lot of finger-pointing about who’s pencil it was and who’s fault it is that this boy has grown up to be such a bad apple.

Jailtime….

Sometime in jail, Evan gets evangemilized. The Alaskan kid is later released and takes flight to South Korea with his Bible and his thoughts. Why he went is a question we’d all like to know- was he passionate about his roots? New Beginnings? Was is about the work of the Lord?

Was it about the food?

Hunziker reported that he was on a mission from God. But God’s Half-Korean emissary arrives and starts drinking… heavily; so heavily that at one point, on holiday in China at the Yalu river, He accepts a dare, strips down to his birthday suit and traverses the watery border between China and North Korea. Dare or a desperate plea to God?

Naked and inebriated…. Hunziker washes up on the banks of the North Korean frontier. He’s collected by farmers who wrap him in swaddling clothes and transfer him to higher powers. Questioned about his travel plans and mode of entry, Hunziker again states he’s on a mission from God.

Obviously North Korea has a very strange diplomatic playbook, and as good relations and grain stores were dwindling around this time, it was decided that Hunziker would be used as a poker chip- a blue poker chip. There was a lot stirring in 1996 …. A murdered South Korean ambassador, a captured DPRK submarine full of brainwashed commandos….

Word gets out that an American is in custody- and of course it’s spun through news channels as if Hunziker is a prized catch. The U.S. scrambles to figure out who the hell Evan Hunziker is. Meanwhile Evan is soaking up foreign culture and the finest in Marxist-Korean cuisine while under hotel-room arrest in one of the capital’s finer establishments. He has plenty of time to think about Jesus and another drink.

Enter Bill Richardson. A pre-goatee Bill Richardson who aims to please. Bill is designated to fly to Pyongyang and make a jailbreak (hard to find weird photo below with EULOGY). Bill arrives and quickly realizes that he may not want to sit next to Hunziker the whole ride home. Before Evan is handed over, there’s the usual RISK reallocation requests- please move your missiles back 200 paces, please send more grain and coco puffs… oh yes and please pay 100,000 USD for the prisoner. Bill looks down at his wallet and then at Hunziker and says, “No way, man.”

The North Korean diplomats decide to cut their losses and just go for Hunziker’s room tab- 5000 USD. Room service, pay per view, standard handling fee? Can you imagine Bill or one of his interns counting out Benjamins on the marble countertop of an empty derelict Hotel Lobby…. Hunziker off by the window, thinking of how it’s going to be back home. It’ll be Thanksgiving day.

Hunziker arrives in time for turkey and pomp. Maybe he was lectured on the plane, threatened, consoled, maybe he just ordered beer. Whatever happened… in one month Evan would have a bullet in his head.

His body was found in the dining room of his mother’s Olympus Motel. All reports assume suicide via sleaze, sluts and gunshot, but there is room for HUH?! Was Evan Hunziker a running man, or is there more to this story? Maybe Bill Knows.

Evan Hunziker Evan C. Hunziker Evan drunk Hunziker and Superhero Bill Richardson North Korea

AND NOW FOR A EULOGY

You swam without a visa

you swam drunk without your clothes

oh deluded soldier of God

Alaska Alaska Alaska

There’s no restraining order anymore

WASHINGTON, Nov. 27 /U.S. Newswire/ — The following was released today by the White House: STATEMENT BY THE PRESS SECRETARY Release of American Citizen Evan Hunziker The president warmly welcomes the release of Evan Carl Hunziker, who had been held by North Korea since late August and arrived today back in the United States.

]]> http://cultandpaste.com/2009/06/05/border-crossing-for-the-ladies/feed/ 3 cultandpaste this is what dyscisio does to your hands http://www.lib.utexas.edu/maps/middle_east_and_asia/north_korea.jpg Evan Hunziker Evan C. Hunziker Evan drunk Hunziker and Superhero Bill Richardson North Korea http://cultandpaste.com/2009/06/01/ambrose-everett-burnside-first-president-of-the-nra/ http://cultandpaste.com/2009/06/01/ambrose-everett-burnside-first-president-of-the-nra/#comments Mon, 01 Jun 2009 18:03:58 +0000 cultandpaste http://cultandpaste.com/?p=815 ]]>

Inventor of the Burnside Carbine and the facial accoutrement named today in his honor.

]]> http://cultandpaste.com/2009/06/01/ambrose-everett-burnside-first-president-of-the-nra/feed/ 0 cultandpaste Ambrose_Burnside_sideburn