Two Witnesses

I know I promised that I would be discussing influential presidents, but after bible study yesterday, we had a discussion that was really interesting.

It started with us talking about how being a Christian means that you are rejected by the world and sometimes meet with some very nasty situations. From this I started talking about Elijah and I made the off hand comment that he was one of the two people who have never died; the other being Enoch (Gen. 5:21-24).

This off hand mention brought a comment by one of the other guys in our study group. He had been talking with someone and how there is a passage in the bible which says that it is man's role to live and die once and then be judged (Heb. 9:27). But there are two men who have not died in the history. His friend made the suggestion that these two men, Elijah and Enoch, could be the two witnesses mentioned in Revelation 11:1-14.

This would make sense as these two witnesses must be very holy men to have the power that they wield. The two witnesses will be killed once and then resurrected. Some people have postulated that the two witnesses may be Elijah and Moses, but Moses has already died once, so why would he need to die again? The more I think about this theory, the more I like it.

On a side note, if anyone is aware of a good history of the Assyrian Empire, I would appreciate someone letting me know about it. I'm hitting a snag in some of my research and need a good combing over of some source material.

Generational Thoughts

When I came into work today, one of the guys I work with told me that the latest big name children's book is a pictorial adaptation of Yellow Submarine by the Beatles. Very interesting given that most of us who know what the original yellow submarine was all about would not exactly consider it a tale for children. But it fed into something that I have been thinking about for the better part of two weeks but haven't posted about.

Two weekends ago, Mrs. X and I were talking and staying in on a Friday. We started discussing things and we got on the topic of a book she has that I have been meaning to read for a little while. The book discusses the cyclic nature of generations and the crises that arise because and to influence those generations. As I have not read the book, I'll do my best to recall what I can and Mrs. X can correct me as she needs to later on.

The cycle can be broken down into four generations:
1) The Hero generation - these are the generation that responds to whatever the great crisis is and takes a powerful leadership role later on as they age.
2) The Obedient generation - too young to respond to the crisis, they grow up in a world where you support your elders and follow orders to better the state.
3) The Idealist generation - Having grown up when the crisis is over, they live in a world of prosperity and adopt very black and white ideals, believing that every problem has a basic fundamental solution.
4) The Forgotten generation - typically overshadowed first by the idealists and then the next hero generation, they are practical and shun overt amounts of attention. They also understand the world as being more shades of grey.

In our more recent history, the generations are broken down as such:
1) Hero - The "Greatest" generation ie. WWII soldiers
2) Obedient - The Silent generation (c. 1928-1945)
3) Idealist - Baby Boomers (1946-1964)
4) Forgotten - Generation X (1965-1981)

Each generation takes it characteristics very much in terms of the above model. We are also in the stages of the next great crisis and the next hero generation (Gen. Next or Gen. Y depending on the labeling) is in the forefront of dealing with it. The idealist generation is in power and dealing with the crisis in the terms it can understand: mostly black and white. The crisis will last a while, until the end when the forgotten generation will rise to power to square away details before overseeing prosperity again.

A historical parallel follows:
During WWII the hero generation rode off to fight while the idealist generation led them (Roosevelt). The problem was simple: Nazis = bad, Allies = good. Eventually the war was won and the heros came home while a new generation of leaders came up. Now they faced a new foe from the ashes, one that had facets of evil and good woven together. The Socialist states looked at the problem differently and would see us as the enemy on occasion, although they were not committed to the great mass conquests that the Nazis were. The idealists of Roosevelt and Truman gave way to the practical Eisenhower. Eisenhower then gave way to the first of the heros (Kennedy) who then took a long hold on power while the country prospered before laying the seeds of the next great conflict.

Next time I'll post our discussion of how each generation tends to identify with a perceived great president of its youth and the influence on history.

What to do with the Sulfur?

Its amazing what you can talk about when you are trying to avoid work. A group of us got on the subject of power plants and how to make them better for the environment. We came up with a pretty good idea. For a coal plant, the two main pollutants are sulfur and carbon-dioxide. There is a process where you use the excess steam to create cooled water. Run that water into a pool and use it to cool the carbon-dioxide. From there you then dissipate the CO2 through a coiled pipe running through the ground in either a forest surrounding the plant or a series of farms surrounding the plant using an osmosis membrane. The extra CO2 will be absorbed by the plants and infuse the air with oxygen.

The only problem we have found is what to do with the sulfur. If you mix it with something, it tends to create a nasty by product. Someone else talked about using an interior plant ring as a sulfur absorber and just replace the plants as they die off. I'm not sure that would be cost effective given how much sulfur you might be pumping out. Once you can figure out what to do with the sulfur, you could do a lot in regard to cleaning up power plants around the world and increasing either food supply or general plant growth. Either option is good.

Guns, Balls and Pucks

Okay, so we can now start paying attention to hockey. With Boston's loss to Montreal we have the Habs playing Tampa Bay and the winner of tonight's Ottawa-Toronto game playing Philly. (Seriously, how did Tampa Bay get the #1 seed?) On the other side, Detroit gets to take on the Calgary Flames while San Jose dukes it out with Colorado. Despite my own personal hatred of them, I think we would save ourselves a lot of time by just giving the cup to Detroit right now. Then we could proceed with the lock out and start speculating on which teams will be erased.

Basketball playoffs are also starting and again, I'm not going to look at them until the first round is over. I really wish they would go back to the best of 5 first round series. We could go back to the possibility of upsets in the first round. My hope is for a San Antonio-Indiana match up in the finals. I'd love to see Reggie go out on top but if he can't than at least lose to a class team like the Spurs. Minnesota would be an acceptable alternative.

A group of us were talking today about sports and someone brought up something rather cool. Here in Cincinnati, GE used to be a major employer and manufacturer. Since they've outsourced a lot of the manufacturing to Wilmington and China, there are several large warehouses that are just standing empty. Our thought was to clear them out of heavy machinery and disinfect them. Then we set up a large scale paintball or laser tag facility in them. There's all kinds of natural obstacles and out of the way offices to plant booby traps and other games. It would be the perfect area of competition. Its even big enough that you could put multiple groups in different buildings or areas of buildings and not worry about them running into each other. You could even have a "night area" where all the paint is glow in the dark and the players would wear night goggles. Give them a real combat experience. Unfortunately it would take a bit of start up capital which we are all lacking, but it would be so interesting to try and do.

Political Disgust

At what point do you draw the line on political attacks? George W. Bush is an inarticulate and incompetent puppet, John Kerry is a flip-flopping hypocrite, Bill Clinton is an oversexed buffoon, and Dan Quayle is a stupid moron. All of these are standard fodder for one side or the other and are actually somewhat tame in relation to history. But, at what point do you cross the line?

There's been some flak down in Florida about a Tampa group that has put up banner ads saying that we should "pull the trigger" and "execute" Don Rumsfeld. A liberal paper has posted that "Uncle Tom" Powell is going out to do the bidding for "Massah" Bush. Gary Trudeau has even stepped in by suggesting that Bush calls Dr. Rice, "Brown Sugar." I'm sure Republicans are doing similar things in areas of strong Democratic support.

I just feel that if you want to paint a perception of a person based on their political actions, you have that right. People may not like it but that's part of politics. But calling for open violence against someone or using racial slurs just because you disagree with someone is a bit over the line.

While I'm in politics, I'd just like to rant on both candidates at the moment. I consider myself a right leaning moderate who will look at both candidates and what they propose. I was very much in favor of Senator Lieberman back during the Democratic primary. The country is very polarized right now and you're going to get about 70% of the country who is going to vote strictly based on whether the candidate has an R or a D next to their name. Since you have a narrow margin of people who pay attention to issues and camp in the middle, you would think that both parties would try and grab a centrist. Nope. Instead you have a tax cut happy, right winger in Bush and a spend, spend spend left winger in Kerry. Quite frankly, neither economic policy agrees with me and its a case of trying to pick the lesser of two evils.

To paraphrase Richard III, "A moderate, a moderate; my kingdom for a moderate."

Bonds vs. History

So, after all the hype and annoyance, Barry Bonds has hit his 660th and 661st home run, officially passing Willie Mays. Hats off to him. Despite my overall dislike of him, due to his topping of Mark McGuire, I have no choice but to respect his performance over the past 15 years. Whether it turns out he's been juiced for the past three or four years, remains to be seen. Innocent until proven guilty, but Barry, just go pee in the cup.

Anyway, I was watching Sportcenter and they were arguing for and against Barry Bonds being the greatest player of all time. I will be the first one to stand up and say that Bonds deserves to be considered in the top 10 (even though I might not put him there) but it seems unfair to say that he's the greatest ever. Let's take a comparison of what he has that other players did not:

-Bonds is able to hover over the plate and not worry about getting brushed back because he wears body armor over his entire arm. This still may not get him plugged in the back, but he drapes his body over the plate, effectively taking away the inside pitch. If you're not afraid of getting hit because it won't hurt, that doesn't say much compared to anyone else who has been up to the plate prior to the last 5-7 years.

-Pitching has degraded in baseball. The strike zone is smaller and pitchers are getting spread throughout a larger league. In the 50's and 60's, you would face about 7-10 clubs who had three or four strong starters lasting through 8-9 innings. Now, no one is leaving their pitchers out longer than 6 or 7 innings. They last longer over the course of time, but you need more pitchers and that drains the pool, along with expansion. 50 years ago, a lineup like the Cubs have would have been the rule and not the exception. Its easier to hit and walk more if you have more pitchers who either can't find the strike zone or hang it over the plate.

-Ballparks are smaller now. I know that Bonds plays in one of the largest and windiest parks in the NL, but they play 81 games in other parks which are smaller and cozier. Also, even if San Francisco is the hardest park in the NL, what does that say if you're only comparing it to easy home run parks. If you say that its as hard to hit a home run in SF as it was in Three Rivers, then you have a legitimate argument.

These are three points that I have thought of against Bonds or many other modern players. This doesn't even count taking pitchers into the mix. How can you readily relate and say that Barry Bonds is as good or better then Sandy Koufax, Nolan Ryan, or Christy Matthewson? Its a very apples and oranges argument and someone who could stand astride both worlds, like Babe Ruth, would have to be considered a great player indeed.

So, Barry is a great player, but I believe that if you took players from the past and gave them Bond's advantages, they would be as good or better. Willie Stargil hit 500 home runs playing in Three Rivers stadium and no one hit home runs there. Imagine if he had played in a ballpark where it was only 400 ft to center and 370 ft on the lines. Or the hits Stan Musial would have gotten if he had been allowed to hang over the plate the way Bonds does. Its just different times and a different measurement stick.

50% Less Oxygen?

The question really is, what is the full impact of having only one nostril? A guy I work with has been having some swelling in his legs and after a bevy of tests, he's of the opinion that its due to some weight he's gained over the winter. This weight causes him to breathe less deeply and that could be leading to the swelling.

As I was thinking about this, I wondered how it might relate to my own situation. For most of the year, I usually have one nostril out of service. In fact, if you place a finger over one of them, I wouldn't even notice because no air is getting in that one to begin with. So what health effects do I suffer as a result and what is the ultimate cause? I can't say any major health effects other than consistent allergy symptoms. Although I do find that I don't feel rested unless I have lots of sleep, but that could also come from being a good 30-40 lbs overweight.

Now, the cause might relate back to when I was about 18 months. We had a big brown Chevy van. The old school ones that you see painted white in any movie involving an FBI conspiracy. Anyway, I fell out of the back of it when I was young and blackened both my eyes. I also may have knocked around some of the stuff in my nose. So who knows what's really wrong with me. I know, no one reading this really cares, but sometimes its fun to talk out loud about various ideas.

On a side note, I'm still playing with the reordering of history. I'm pretty sure we can peg down the fall of Jericho to about 1406 BC. It would be helpful if I could peg down the battle of Meggido fought under Deborah because that might give me a firm time point for Thutmoses III. But I'll keep researching. We shall just have to be patient.

Hockey in Egypt

No more basketball. UConn won both the men's and women's tourneys. I give myself a nice pat on the back and say let's move on.

For the few of you keeping track, its Denver vs. Maine for the NCAA Hockey Finals. I did manage to watch the tail end of the Maine-BC game. Pretty good of what I saw. Given that the final is being played in Boston, I give the edge to Maine, but it would be interesting to see Denver knock them off.

Stanley Cup Playoffs are underway and I don't have the foggiest idea what the rankings are. After we weed out the first round I'll pay a little more attention. Given that this most likely is the last season for a little while, its been a very sorry way to go out. At this point, I think hockey is close to dead anywhere south of Detroit. We'll get some thinning of the league over the course of the lockout and that may not be a bad thing.

Probably the thing that's been grabbing my attention for most of the past couple of days is some more ancient chronology work. Its interesting that many historians and archaeologists discount the bible (old and new testament) because they are so tied into certain ideas and when something doesn't jive with that, they dismiss it. One interesting point was the excavation of the city of Jericho conducted in the 20s and 30s. The archeologist in charge sorted through and noted the walls falling down due to a major catastrophe (earthquake or such) and then a major fire. The city was lightly rebuilt and then torched again. Then, after a dormant period, the city was rebuilt. The archaeologist's dating of the collapse of the walls and the first fire fell around 1400BC and the second fire about 200 years or so later. He didn't do much with it and a second archeologist came in around 1950 or so and claimed that he had been in error with his dates and that all this happened much earlier than he claimed so that the theory that the Israelites entered Canaan around 1250 could be preserved.

But, if you use that theory, then you have no evidence of the walls falling under Joshua's attack, or the burning of the Benjaminite cities during the first civil war (Judges 19-21) (Jericho was a manned outpost controlled by the tribe of Benjamin). So, modern scholars say that the stories of Joshua aren't true, because it wouldn't fit their timeline.

I'm still reading the pages and doing some independent research myself but the author does make for some interesting arguments. It also clears up a few problems I've had in my own mind. The biggest one I can think of is that the pharaoh during the Exodus has always been named as Ramses II, arguably the most powerful pharaoh of all time. Yet we've always just been led to believe that Ramses II continued on to greatness and glory after losing a vast slave workforce and a substantial portion of his chariot army? That's always bugged me. But under some of the new theories, Ramses II reign is pushed forward to the time of the Judges and Samuel, possibly even early David.

I'll post more information and how I work my brain around it later. If you want to read some of his theories yourself go to Bible Mysteries. Take some things with a grain of salt, but others bear definate consideration.

Random Rants

Don't you hate it when you have a good idea to talk about or research, then get distracted by something and can't remember what your great idea was? Hopefully it'll come back to me soon so I won't have to bore all 3 of you who read this.

No, I'm not going to talk about basketball. I'll save that for tomorrow or Thursday. Thursday we also have the Frozen Four semis. So we'll get all kinds of talk about sports then. Not that I'll be able to watch the games. The first one is at noon and the second is at 6. Maunday Thursday services start at 7 so no hockey for me that night.

I didn't really watch most of the game because I was watching Peter Jennings thing on Jesus and Paul. I watched the first hour, then had to tape the rest because I was talking to Mrs. X on the phone. I did get to catch the last half hour and I'll watch the rest tonight. What I did watch last night seemed interesting. Obviously I'm going to disagree with some of the "experts" they have on, but I think ABC did a good job of presenting a fairly objective interpretation of the situation, at least of the Jesus side of things. Now, I can't say if they did the same for Paul. I'll let you know more on that when I watch the rest tonight while Mrs. X is watching her American Idol.

Perusing the news we have Ted Kennedy setting the way back machine to 35 years ago. You ever notice how every conflict is Vietnam now? I remember two political cartoons that came out back when the war had just ended. The first one had a soldier walking and being chased by these little people with cameras saying, "Why haven't you won the war yet?". Then in the second panel, the soldier says that they won. In the third panel the camera people start saying, "Why haven't you won the peace yet?" The second cartoon was a one panel with an Uncle Sam being followed by a pack of dogs saying, "Is it Vietnam yet?"

Part of this problem is that life is still dominated by the baby boom generation who also seem to think that they are God's gift to this planet. John Kerry has been running on his Vietnam war service record and the media wouldn't let the story die about Bush possibly skirting Air National Guard Service during the war. You want to know what? I DON'T CARE! I don't give a rat's ass what a person did in a war that many years ago. FDR did a great job running a war and he never fought in combat. But, the baby boom generation has to make it an issue as long as they run things. NPR ran an editorial by a Gen X reporter who said expressly that what a person did in Vietnam doesn't matter. Its what they can or can't do now.

My own personal beliefs are that we just have survive for a little while until the baby boomers can be displaced. Maybe I'm just overly cynical, but I just don't have any faith in my parent's generation. Obviously not all of them are like that, but just about anyone in power is. Moral cowards and hypocrites all.

Damn hippies.

Dual Championship?

It just wouldn't be early April if the UConn women and Tennessee women weren't playing each other. Yep. Since 1995 I think there were only 2 years that the two schools didn't play each other during the tournament and 4 times they have met in the finals. Although, how Tenn. has gotten there is just beyond me. They've had to come from behind in all of their tournament games and at least twice they got the blessing of lady luck. The Baylor game call was just stupid. Two people ran into each other going for a ball. No foul on either side. Then there was last night's LSU game. Game tied with 6 seconds to go. LSU ball inbounding from their end. Tenn. uses full court press and the best player LSU has, falls down. Tenn. recovers and lays it in for an easy 2 with 1.6 to go. Game over. Tennessee is either the luckiest team you have ever seen or there is a big conspiracy to get UConn and Tenn. to match up again.

You laugh but it may be true. Tennessee gets top ranking so they get first round bye. Then they get the "foul" against Baylor. They manage to get to the final four without being too incompetent and then they have luck again favor them to beat hometown LSU (final four in New Orleans). Meanwhile, despite being the No. 2 seed in the East, UConn plays all first four games in Connecticut. The first two games go the higher seed's home I think and then it was scheduled that the East Region finals and semi-finals would be in Hartford. It does seem to smack of conspiracy.

On the other gender, the UConn men will rematch with Georgia Tech. I have UConn winning in my bracket so I'll be rooting for them. Plus, experience would tend to favor UConn. Both teams played hard games Saturday night so I don't think either team will have a burnout advantage. Its just health and depth of bench. I think UConn is a little healthier, geared up, and looking to avenge the loss in the preseason NIT.

So, I think there is a legitimate possibility of a dual basketball championship for UConn. I would favor the men over Georgia Tech and the Tennessee women are just not impressing me with their wins. I would also take UConn there too. We shall see.

Entertainment Recap

Well, step 1 in the media process is done. Yesterday as I was finishing watching "West Wing," I saw a made for TV movie advertised. The movie will be on NBC, Sunday April 11. Its title is Homeland Security. While the description on NBC's website seems to make it look like its going to follow counter-terrorism agents in the field, the pictures I saw tell a very different story. It appears to me to be a movie of the events leading up to, during, and the retaliation for 9/11. While I'm sure its going to be very up with the people and we're so patriotic, it still bothers me. If its easy to make a movie about the event, how much time will pass before its just another big event in history, suitable for exploitation by Hollywood scriptwriters? That's still a big step away, but the little first step has been taken.

On lighter entertainment news, I enjoyed West Wing for the first time in quite a few episodes. I'm a little partial to CJ centered stories, mostly because she is the most well rounded and human character on the show. She's also the best actor on the show, possibly with the exception of Martin Sheen but its a thin separation at best. I also like the mockumentary style which gives it a more real look. Its easy to get emotionally invested in a situation like that. Similar but not quite as campy as the live ER episode a few years back.

Survivor is on tonight as well as the Apprentice. For Apprentice and American Idol information, please go to The Couch Critic. I don't really follow that show. Now, Survivor, I do watch. I can't make any speculation on it because of the twist coming up. What little stuff I've seen, leads me to believe that there will be a tribal mix up. Some preview pictures for tonight's episode showed Boston Rob in a green buff and some of the Mogo Mogo people in the red buffs. Rob and (L)Amber seem to be split up as well. Its really going to depend on how the tribes shake up. I think Jerri has the biggest target on her back, but until we can see how people have been placed fully, we won't know which alliances are intact. Should be interesting.