Book Review: The Omnivore's Dilemma

Going to the grocery store can be downright confusing. For a long time now I've felt that there is such a thing as too many choices, especially when it comes to the supermarket. When Michael Pollan touched on the same subject in his book The Omnivore's Dilemma, I was glad to see that I was not alone with this feeling.

The "omnivore's dilemma" revolves around the age old question of, "what's for dinner?" Since we humans have the capacity of memory and speech, we are able to pass along the vast body of accumulated knowledge regarding what tastes good and is healthy, and what tastes bad and can kill us. Koalas, for example, do not have this problem because they know what's on their menu every day for every meal: eucalyptus leaves. Mr. Pollan's thesis is that we've arrived back at the point in time when we are at a loss to know what to eat because we have so many choices, many of which aren't really choices at all, but rather clever re-packaging of the same products. Walking down the supermarket aisle trying to decide what is good and what is bad reasserts the omnivore's dilemma.

When I picked up this book I was skeptical. I did not want to waste my time reading a diatribe against the corporate food structure, the sins of animal protein and the virtues of veganism. For some, eating food is a supremely political act, and these people seem to get published in spades. For me, eating food is just lunch most of the time--unless it's breakfast or dinner. Ultimately though, I believe in eating locally; I prefer to BBQ the flesh of a happily raised, drug-free animal, and I like to know where my food comes from.

Mr. Pollan follows four meals from production to the plate. The first part of the book is devoted to corn, and how it permeates virtually every corner of the supermarket (and beyond) in some form or another. He visits a farmer in Iowa and delves deeply into how subsidies motivate farmers to grow an ever increasing corn yield even when it makes no economic sense. He also highlights exactly how entrenched the military-industrial complex is in our food chain, and the tremendous amounts of toxic waste created from field runoff and industrial scale feedlots. Not much about industrial corn crops and farm subsidies was new to me; and having driven past "Cow-schwitz" on interstate 5 in the Central Valley numerous times, I was familiar with the stench and the layout of a cattle feedlot. The meal derived from this exercise turns out to be lunch from McDonald's for his family eaten in their car while traveling down the highway.

More informative was the section where he shops at his local Whole Foods Market for an organic/free-range meal. After interviewing and visiting a handful of 70's hippies-turned-capitalists farmers, he determines that the whole "organic" craze is basically a clever way of marketing to guilt-ridden mothers trying to do the right thing. Turns out the massive organic farms that cater to Whole Foods are virtually as industrial as "industrial" farms--they just don't use chemical pesticides which brings into play a whole host of other problems; and "free range" hardly lives up to the images the term inspires in the mind's eye.

Mr. Pollan then visits Polyface Farm and spends a week working with the owner, Joe Salatin. Polyface Farm is "beyond organic". It is a perfect example of zero-waste and low impact farming; the way farming used to be. Everything produced is part of a self-perpetuating cycle. Mr. Salatin thinks of himself as a great conductor, orchestrating the natural rhythms of his farm. He believes, correctly, that an animal is happiest when it is free to do its animal "thing". All of his cows, pigs, rabbits and chickens are allowed to live this way before they are slaughtered. Clearly, Polyface farm is the antitheses of industrial farming.

Being an amateur mycologist myself, the last part of the book is what resonated most deeply with me as it was devoted to a "hunter and gatherer" meal. He learned to hunt, shot a wild boar, foraged for morel and chantrelle mushrooms, picked fruit from around his neighborhood, and prepared a wonderful meal from scratch for all the people that assisted him in his quest.

I found the entire book well written, well researched, informative and often humorous, but it is the following paragraph that really stuck with me for some reason:

The fact that you cannot come out of hunting feeling unambiguously good about it is perhaps what should commend the practice to us. You certainly don't come out of it eager to protest your innocence. If I've learned anything about hunting and eating meat, it's that it's even messier than the moralist thinks. Having killed a pig and looked at myself in that picture and now looking forward (if that's the word) to eating that pig, I have to say there is a part of me that envies the moral clarity of the vegetarian, the blamelessness of the tofu eater. Yet part of me pities him too. Dreams of innocence are just that; they usually depend on a denial of reality that can be its own form of hubris. Ortega suggests that there is an immorality in failing to look clearly at reality, or in believing the force of human will can somehow overcome it. "The preoccupation with what should be is estimable only when the respect for what is has been exhausted."

Those last two lines are brilliant; and unfortunate examples of this state of mind can be found far outside the pages of this book.

I'm a foodie at heart and I've always had more than a passing interest in nutrition. If it were not my job to babysit rich people's money every day and I was looking for an alternate career, I might choose to be a nutritionist. Back in my culinary school days, nutrition classes were my favorite, and "you are what you eat" has always resonated with me because it is important to know what you are putting into your body every time you sit down to a meal. None of this is to say I treat my body like a temple, but most of the time I eat right; at least what I view as right. Milk is for cows, processed food is the devil, you cannot eat too many leafy green vegetables, there's no reason to drink soda unless there's bourbon in it, too much fatty meat will clog your arteries, fast food always smells better than it tastes. Those are my general guidelines, but above all I enjoy tasty, well prepared, quality, food; and like the French I believe it's bad manners to not eat "this" or abstain from "that" when in social settings.

Ultimately, good nutrition boils down to the timeless wisdom of grandpa: "moderation is the key". A healthy state of mind is a big component of good overall health. Eat what makes you feel good, just don't eat too much of it and don't eat it everyday. That way, when you choose to eat a chili dog topped with a fried egg, sausage and cheese, know that you should probably forget the regular coke and wash it all down with a diet coke instead.

Burning Man 2007

Third time's a charm they say; I can't argue with that. Now that I've attended Burning Man 3 times the playa seems familiar to me. The taste of alkaline dust, the angle of the sun, the direction of the breeze, the dry, hot air, the cool of the dawn and the freaks that surround me--all strangely familiar; all strangely warm and comforting. It amazes me how so many are quick to judge the event; so quick to put this or that label on it. I alluded to this fact the first time I posted about my Black Rock City experience in 2005. Burning Man is this, Burning Man is that, blah blah blah. Here's what Burning Man is--it's exactly what you make it.




This year I did not purchase tickets early when they are the cheapest due to the fact I did not think we would be attending since we now have a 7 month old daughter at home. I am not opposed to taking a child to the playa, in fact I think it's a great place for a kid of the right age under the right circumstances. However, I am of the opinion that it is no place for a 7 month old. If you're too young to verbalize what is making you uncomfortable, you're too young for the playa. What I did not expect was how bad my wife wanted to attend this year after sitting out last year due to her pregnancy.




As the event drew near, I could see she was serious, so I started to make plans. The first order of business was securing a motorhome. It's perfectly fine to camp on the playa--most people do--but I know enough to know that a comfortable wife means a happy husband; and the only place where comfort is guaranteed on the playa--for happily married people at least--is the inside of their own motorhome. Though I've never been a particular fan of RV living, being new parents, I could see the benefits of owning a motorhome beyond the comfort it would ensure while at Burning Man. As luck would have it, our friends Mark and Shannon who live outside of Sacramento and also have a young daughter decided they were in the market for an RV as well, so we thought it wise to pool our resources and partner in the purchase of one. We certainly did not want to buy a brand new model as they depreciate quicker than an automobile, so we figured a well maintained used RV would be our target. It did not take us long to find what we were looking for, which turned out to be a 1993 31 ft class "A" Bounder. It was a little bigger than what we had idealized, but the price was right and the features and floor plan exceeded our expectations. Burning Man would be "Thumper's" maiden voyage, and I would be the captain.



Labor day weekend being what it is, we already had plans to be in Mexico for a big 40th birthday party, so the time we could be on the playa was limited to a few days at the front end of the week. Fortunately a few members of our camp had planned on arriving even earlier than us, so we pulled into an already constructed camp just before dawn on Monday morning. Sunrise on the playa is by far my favorite time, so we quickly unloaded our bicycles, greeted our camp mates who were in various stages of sleep and headed out to say good morning to the "work week."



One of the more striking differences between the first and last days of Burning Man is the relative tranquility at the beginning. In my mind the playa resembled a meadow just after a fresh snowfall: unsullied and serene. Much of the art remained in various stages of completion, and the prevailing mood of the people I met seemed to be relaxed and rested, sort of like the mood of most cities early in the week.




We decided to call our camp the Garden of Heathens, and it was our best camp to date. Pretty much from the day Burning Man ended last year up to the commencement of this year's event, my friend from high school Steve had been planning for our camp, and he did not disappoint. His contribution included a military surplus desert tent that acted as our living room, a bar and bar stools; he even put a beer tap on the outside of his small RV that was connected to a keg (6 actually!) chilling in the closet inside. Pure genius. Dave, in what has become his custom and trademark, provided the "mini-mog" sound system and hours of full spectrum beats. Banyra, in a demonstration of dream-into-action, built a carnival wheel that morphed into the "Wheel of Miss Fortune" and became the centerpiece of our bar. That wheel took on a life of it's own. Games were created, rules were invented, and a naked barbie was eventually ritualistically nailed to the center. Mrs. Jrod and a random denizen of BlackRock City painted and decorated the bar. Goldie provided the "Garden of Heathens" banner. It's great to see the gang rise to the occasion.





Despite early reports of severe wind and dust storms, the weather while we were there was nothing short of perfect. We were even treated to a full lunar eclipse Monday night that turned the playa from a full moon playground to a dark and mischievous fun house in a matter of minutes.







And mischievous it was. For the first time ever, the Man burned before his time. The most shocking thing about this is that it took this many years to happen. Though we'll never really know exactly how it happened, conventional wisdom holds that a fella by the name of Paul Addis decided to climb the Man just as all eyes were on the lunar eclipse and toss a molotov cocktail at him. Mr. Addis then jumped onto the green canopy underneath and slid down to the ground where he was apprehended by BRC rangers without incident.


At the time, I had been taking a "nap" after an initial 36 hours of being up and at 'em. Mrs. Jrod had just come back to camp to get me up for the eclipse--I definitely did not want to miss that. We were heading back out to the Opulent Temple to meet our friends. When we approached the playa, we heard the tremendous roar of a crowd--similiar to what one might hear at a baseball game. I though, "man, there must be something really good going on out there." As we got closer, we could see that the Burning Man Pavillion was surrounded by art cars and a sea of people. It looked and sounded just like it would on the Night of the Burn. It was then that I spotted what looked like two giant gossamer sheets of silk undulating hypnotically on either side of The Man--but something about the whole scene felt slightly out of place. As we got closer, we could see that several of the blinking lights were real live fire trucks. There may be any number of "fire trucks" on the playa at any given moment which makes it next to impossible to tell what's real and what's not, but clearly these were the real things. What I had mistaken for beautiful pieces of silk flapping in the breeze were actually two powerful streams of water, *gasp*, trained on The Man!


They were hosing down The Man.

The "man" was extinguishing The Man.

Chuck, they were Saving the Man.


The irony of this whole unscheduled event is self-evident, so this is the part where I fight the urge to wax philosophical...


As the full moon passed outside of the earth's shadow and dawn slowly crept over the horizon, the full extent of the damage was brought into plain view. The Man was singed badly, but not mortally wounded. Too bad He wasn't packed with a cocktail of explosives and fireworks yet, that would have been quite a sight to behold! The green canopy underneath was melted in certain places, but it was far from destroyed. All in all, it looked like the Man would survive; though that did not stop the "man" from removing him with a giant crane before the sun was high in the sky. Judging by the reaction of some, taking the Man down was akin to holding a magnet in front of their compass--they were utterly "lost." For me, I was just happy that our planned early departure didn't force me to miss the Burn like I thought it would.



The remaining day and a half we had left to enjoy BlackRock City was spent doing "more" of "the same." Silliness was witnessed, yuks were had, art was interacted, jams were kicked out, bikes were pedaled. I wish we could have stayed a few more days to have some fun with the rest of our campmates as they rolled into town, but we were fortunate to have even gone at all. Afterall, grandma can only take care of the daughter and the doggie for so long. I will say the Exodus on a Wednesday afternoon is incomparably better and more relaxing than it is at the end of the week. As usual, in retrospect it was another surreal experience. So fleeting physically, but the memories remain.



It will be interesting to see how Burning Man shapes up in the future--especially in the wake of Mr. Addis's decision to start the campfire a little early. It's getting really big, and for the first time I am beginning to see the point certain veteran burners have when they bemoan what it's become and pine for the "good ol' days" when it was small and there were no rules. I don't necessarily agree because I think Burning Man is dynamic above all else, but I can see a difference in just three years.




Annoyingly, this year's theme seemed to be politically motivated: "The Greening of the Man." The contradiction is obvious; how do you (or why should you) "green" a festival that celebrates fire?


Here's what a friend of mine had to say about his experience. He is a 6 year veteran who returned this year after a two year hiatus:

i LOVED the art.... some of the best i have ever seen... opulent was off the hook evry night i went .... better than prior years... personally had a really good time... NOT on par with a couple of my other burns, but that is solely because a couple of my closest friends in the world didnt make the trip this yr.... i missed em.... definitely saw some JV shit go on... i picked up cups and beer cans in a number of places which was disappointing... also witnessd one episode where some burningman volunteers were agro and nasty which was disappointing too.... but it still is undoubtedly the greatest show on earth.... this year was just BIGGER

Trash talking and trash tossing: two hallmarks of any city. For better or worse, it sounds like BlackRock City is experiencing growing pains. Unfortunately, when a community gets dissolved into the anonymity that a city affords, people often act like the twat-waffles they really are.



I'll reiterate what I said at the beginning of this post: Burning Man is exactly what you make it. The excitement and anticipation many people feel when talking about, planning and participating in it is genuine--and that cannot be discounted.

Nevertheless, I can't shake the feeling that the Man has become "the man."

Financial Models and Market Volatility

As anybody who pays attention to the stock market will tell you, these past few weeks have been particularly volatile. Volatility is what drives a market really. Volatility creates opportunity; it also destroys wealth if one is not careful.

The past few years have seen a major sea-change wash over Wall Street regarding the way it conducts business. Many jobs that were formerly carried out by a living, breathing person are now being done by a computer model, especially in the equities arena. But models are only as smart as the person programming them, and these past few weeks have been humbling for many "quant" guys to say the least.

I could never shake the feeling that the almost countless number of hedge funds popping up virtually each day were all using essentially the same algorithms to employ the same strategies across the same markets. Taking this feeling to it's logical end will lead one to conclude that the marketplace is crowded with many people doing the same thing, just like sheep.

Since I am one of a declining number of living, breathing bodies left on Wall Street, I can not help but feel a bit of schadenfreude at the misfortune many of these quantitative hedge funds are experiencing at the moment. Math Ph.d's and statistical geniuses have their place in finance to be sure, but perhaps they may want to take a moment to reflect on a few of the things I have learned over the course of my career:

• The stock market is a fickle dance partner
• If you are in a "crowded" trade, you better be the first one out of it when things go bad
• You may think something is worth X, but it's really only worth as much as somebody else is willing to pay for it. Don't be surprised if it's 20 cents on the dollar.
  
• If I'm a seller and there's no buyer around, the smartest algorithm in the world isn't going to find me a buyer
• Nobody can accurately predict, let alone factor human emotion into a trade
• All models work, until they don't
  

The following snippets from a Financial Times article (subscription only) perfectly illustrate the hubris that many quant funds fell prey to.

Limitations of computer models

By Gillian Tett and Anuj Gangahar

Published: August 14 2007 19:28 | Last updated: August 14 2007 19:28

In recent years, Goldman Sachs has become renowned as one of the savviest players on Wall Street. This week, however, the mighty US bank was forced into an embarrassing admission.

In a rare unplanned investor call, the bank revealed that a flagship global equity fund had lost over 30 per cent of its value in a week because of problems with its trading strategies created by computer models. In particular, the computers had failed to foresee recent market movements to such a degree that they labelled them a “25-standard deviation event” – something that only happens once every 100,000 years or more.

The credit crunch caused by the sub-prime meltdown was an event that nobody saw coming. The resulting fallout was something that was 25 standard deviations beyond the realm of reasonable possibilities--something that could only occur once in 100,000 years. Please, pass the doobie my way! Acknowledging that hindsight is 20/20 and all that, even I saw the sub-prime meltdown coming last April; and I am far from the savviest guy on the Street.

“We are seeing things that were 25-standard deviation events, several days in a row,” said David Viniar, Goldman’s chief financial officer. “There have been some issues [before] in some of the other quantitative spaces, but nothing like what we saw last week.”

So something that should only occur once every 100,000 years is actually happening several days in a row. I wish I had that kind of luck playing the lottery. I might buy a ticket from time to time.

By any standards, it is a striking admission, given that these losses at the Goldman fund could top $1.5bn (£750m, €1.1bn). But what is more startling still is that Goldman Sachs is not alone in seeing its models go haywire. On the contrary, in recent days a host of other funds have experienced similar difficulties, including highly renowned funds at Renaissance Technologies.

James Simons, founder of Renaissance and one of the most respected quantitative fund managers, last week wrote a letter to investors saying losses were about 9 per cent in the first few days of August (the funds have since recovered at least some of the losses). He also tellingly wrote that “we cannot predict the duration of the current environment,” highlighting the fact that even a group such as Renaissance – whose flagship fund, Medallion, has had an annual return of 30 per cent since 1988 – is suffering badly from recent movements.

An annual return of 30% since 1988 is stellar I'd say. Taking into account the standard hedge fund fee of 2% of total assets plus 20% of profits, somebody that invested $100,000 19 years ago and let the profits ride each year would be $4.3 million richer today. Of course that's before taxes. I wonder how Medallion would quantify, "suffering badly" in that context?

A glance at recent financial history shows that this type of “rare” event is not so unusual at all. Back in 1998, for example, a key reason for the near-implosion of Long Term Capital Management was that the fund’s economic whizzkids – who included some Nobel prize-winning economists – had devised model-based trading strategies that turned sour when markets moved in unforeseen ways. Similarly, two years ago the financial industry received a shock when General Motors, the US car group, was downgraded – a move that left the price of financial assets gyrating in relation to each other in ways computers had not predicted.

The question now being asked by some bankers – and regulators – is whether this week’s events show that the modern financial industry is foolish to be placing so much faith in these complex computer-driven models.

“People say these are one-in-a-100,000-years events but they seem to happen every year,” says Satyajit Das, a consultant to hedge funds and investment banks. “This episode should make people ask questions about models – I think it could lead to a real reassessment.”

Finally, a voice of reason. Truth be told though, the market can handle blow ups like this from time to time. I think it's a good thing actually. Call it the Darwinism of the marketplace; it keeps people honest, and it washes out the poseurs. Heck, it may even keep me relevant for a few more years.

The whole story reminds me of the Maginot Line. Essentially when the Germans reached France, they saw the complex fortifications the French had meticulously built, and simply went around them.

I wonder what those who are modeling climate change think of all this?

Dumpster Diving: It's What's for Dinner

Far be it my place to judge others' way of life. I am firmly of the mind that one should live whatever lifestyle one chooses so long as it does not physically or mentally harm others; especially my family or I. There is something I find peculiar in our Western way of life however. There seems to be an increasing number of people who feel tremendous guilt over the society we've collectively built and the way we live. To be sure, it is sometimes decadent, especially when compared to the billions of souls that live hand to mouth or scavenge for their daily bread. There is also much waste in our society--food, materials, energy--you name it. Excessive waste is bound to be prevalent when one lives in a land of plenty. Though a point never discussed by guilt-ridden Westerners is that we have built and enjoy exactly the society we deserve. It is not our failing that others have not prospered as we have. Wealth creation is not a zero-sum game. Abiding by the Rule of Law, and all the stability that follows, is not so complicated that it can only be understood in the West.

It is not difficult to observe movements or lifestyles taken to extremes in this day and age. After all, a by-product of a society where virtually every material comfort is available with little to no effort is ample free-time; and there are as many ways to spend free-time as there are David Hasselhoff albums in a landfill. As I stated before, there is an abundance of waste generated in our society, but we're getting better. Today more items are made from compostable/recyclable materials than yesterday. Tomorrow there will be even more. Happily, it seems the overall consciousness of how much waste we generate has been raised. This means that someday, freegans will have to find another way to spend their ample free-time.

Today, the New York Times brings us the following article that profiles a group of people that are busy going through dumpsters full of cast-offs from recently graduated NYU students:

The site, which provides information and listings for the small but growing subculture of anticonsumerists who call themselves freegans — the term derives from vegans, the vegetarians who forsake all animal products, as many freegans also do — is the closest thing their movement has to an official voice. And for those like Ms. Elia and Ms. Kalish, it serves as a guide to negotiating life, and making a home, in a world they see as hostile to their values.

Freegans are scavengers of the developed world, living off consumer waste in an effort to minimize their support of corporations and their impact on the planet, and to distance themselves from what they see as out-of-control consumerism. They forage through supermarket trash and eat the slightly bruised produce or just-expired canned goods that are routinely thrown out, and negotiate gifts of surplus food from sympathetic stores and restaurants.

Modern day hunters and gathers--a romantic notion indeed. It begs the question though--if not for corporate producers and consumerists, for what would freegans forage?

They dress in castoff clothes and furnish their homes with items found on the street; at freecycle.org, where users post unwanted items; and at so-called freemeets, flea markets where no money is exchanged. Some claim to hold themselves to rigorous standards. “If a person chooses to live an ethical lifestyle it’s not enough to be vegan, they need to absent themselves from capitalism,” said Adam Weissman, 29, who started freegan.info four years ago and is the movement’s de facto spokesman.

Freeganism dates to the mid-’90s, and grew out of the antiglobalization and environmental movements, as well as groups like Food Not Bombs, a network of small organizations that serve free vegetarian and vegan food to the hungry, much of it salvaged from food market trash. It also has echoes of groups like the Diggers, an anarchist street theater troupe based in Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco in the 1960’s, which gave away food and social services.

What turns me off about groups like this is that they inevitably have a political bend. It's not enough to simply live their chosen lifestyle quietly, they have to create a movement and carry a banner.

Many freegans are predictably young and far to the left politically, like Ms. Elia, the 17-year-old, who lives with her father in Manhattan. She said she became a freegan both for environmental reasons and because “I’m not down with capitalism.”

I hope they interview Ms. Elia in 10 years when she's 27 years old--assuming she does not succumb to botulism or salmonella poisoning in the meantime. I'd be curious to see where she is in her life; and if she's still not "down" with capitalism.

It’s not that freeganism doesn’t require serious commitment. For freegans, who believe that the production and transport of every product contributes to economic and social injustice, usually in multiple ways, any interaction with the marketplace is fraught. And for some freegans in particular — for instance, Madeline Nelson, who until recently was living an upper-middle-class Manhattan life with all the attendant conveniences and focus on luxury goods — choosing this way of life involves a considerable, even radical, transformation.

Every product transported and purchased contributes to social injustice--usually in multiple ways. I 'd love to see that cause and effect flowchart.

After a year of progressively scaling back — no more shopping at Eileen Fisher, no more commuting by means other than a bike — Ms. Nelson, who had a two-bedroom apartment with a mortgage in Greenwich Village, quit her job in 2005 to devote herself full-time to political activism and freeganism.

She sold her apartment, put some money into savings, and bought a one-bedroom in Flatbush, Brooklyn, that she owns outright.

“My whole point is not to be paying into corporate America, and I hated paying a big loan to a bank,” she said while fixing lunch in her kitchen one recent afternoon. The meal — potato and watercress soup and crackers and cheese — had been made entirely from refuse left outside various grocery stores in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

I am sure Ms. Nelson gives thanks each day to corporate America for providing the opportunity for her to take out a mortgage on an apartment she was later able to sell at a profit in such a blatantly capitalistic fashion. Certainly she appreciates the stability of the system that allows her to store her money in a savings account earning interest; and even insures that money up to $100,000 against any calamity.

But isn’t she depriving herself unnecessarily? And what’s so bad about buying books, anyway? “I do have some mixed feelings,” Ms. Nelson said. “It’s always hard to give up class privilege. But freegans would argue that the capitalist system is not sustainable. You’re exploiting resources.” She added, “Most people work 40-plus hours a week at jobs they don’t like to buy things they don’t need.”

Class privilege, like living in New York City? And I wouldn't give up on the capitalist system just yet. It's been around since Ahmed discovered if he lit a fire on the sand he could make glass and sell it in the bazaar. And finally, Ms. Nelson's anti-consumerist crystal ball confirms that "most people" hate their jobs but work anyhow so they can waste their money on stuff they really don't need. I know that's why I go to the office every day.

I agree that we live in a hyper-consumer society. I do not need a designer coffee shop on every street corner. I do not require another outlet mall out by the highway. I am not happy to see advertisements plastered in every empty nook and cranny. I grimace when I get a delivery from Pottery Barn and there's a 4'x4' box of packing material protecting a table cloth. So I don't buy coffee on every street corner; I don't stop at that outlet mall out by the highway; I ignore ads that are placed everywhere I look; I recycle the box and packing material and go about my life; and that's all I do. Oh the guilt. I think I'll go play outside until I feel better.

In many parts of the world, the freegan movement would not be recognized as a movement at all; it would simply be called "survival". I wonder how many people in the world would be willing to take up the lives many of these freegans formerly lived before they indulged their spasm of Western guilt? In the end, I am left thinking that the freegan movement, like so many others, is just another form of mental onanism.

Vaclav Klaus on Global Warming

Vaclav Klaus, the current president of the Czech Republic and a man who lived for many years under communist rule, believes that the biggest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity today is not communism, but rather ambitious environmentalism. Though his comparison may be an anachronism given the current threat we face from Islamofascism, it is nevertheless valid. Communism is rightly discredited and mostly dead the world over save for a few pathetic examples.

From the Financial Times article linked above:

The issue of global warming is more about social than natural sciences and more about man and his freedom than about tenths of a degree Celsius changes in average global temperature.

As a witness to today's worldwide debate on climate change, I suggest the following:

*Small climate changes do not demand far-reaching restrictive measures

*Any suppression of freedom and democracy should be avoided

*Instead of organising people from above, let us allow everyone to live as he wants

*Let us resist the politicisation of science and oppose the term "scientific consensus", which is always achieved only by a loud minority, never by a silent majority

*Instead of speaking about "the environment", let us be attentive to it in our personal behaviour

*Let us be humble but confident in the spontaneous evolution of human society. Let us trust its rationality and not try to slow it down or divert it in any direction

*Let us not scare ourselves with catastrophic forecasts, or use them to defend and promote irrational interventions in human lives.

The fourth bullet point that Mr. Klaus touches upon, where he talks of the dangers of "scientific consensus", brings to mind a new bastardization of the scientific method that the green revolution crowd has introduced called "post-normal" science. Post-normal science is now being employed as proof of Global Warming; it being so important that everyone must act to stop it, regardless of whether or not it is scientifically known to exist.

Mike Hulme, the founding director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, has this to say: (from a Guardian article via a Belmont Club posting)

Philosophers and practitioners of science have identified this particular mode of scientific activity as one that occurs where the stakes are high, uncertainties large and decisions urgent, and where values are embedded in the way science is done and spoken. It has been labelled "post-normal" science. ... The danger of a "normal" reading of science is that it assumes science can first find truth, then speak truth to power, and that truth-based policy will then follow. ... If only climate change were such a phenomenon and if only science held such an ascendancy over our personal, social and political life and decisions. In fact, in order to make progress about how we manage climate change we have to take science off centre stage. ... What matters about climate change is not whether we can predict the future with some desired level of certainty and accuracy; it is whether we have sufficient foresight, supported by wisdom, to allow our perspective about the future, and our responsibility for it, to be altered. All of us alive today have a stake in the future, and so we should all play a role in generating sufficient, inclusive and imposing knowledge about the future. Climate change is too important to be left to scientists - least of all the normal ones.

In other words, scientists cannot be trusted with science, because they may arrive at an unwanted conclusion; therefore the scientific process must be bypassed in favor of "post-normal" science--for the good of the planet. I think the danger in this line of thinking is self-evident.

Unfortunately, humanity's hubris regarding our power to change the environment forces many to take a short view of the world we live in. If one accepts that the earth is approximately 4.4 billion years old, and that for all intents and purposes, modern man appeared on the scene about 10,000 years ago when we stopped a nomadic existence and began farming, one would see that in terms of a 24 hour clock, man has existed for a mere 19 seconds. Geologically speaking, humanity barely registers a blip on the radar. It could be argued that man has done an incredible amount of damage to his environment in a mere 19 seconds, but that would be a short view. I am of the mind that nature is a much larger force and much less fragile than self-proclaimed environmentalists give her credit for being. Environmentalist hubris does not allow me to consider any other conclusion.

Global Warming Drought Hysteria

It doesn't take a hyperventilating physicist to figure out that this winter's snowfall was below average in the Sierra Nevada. As one of my friends calculated it, we had exactly 6 powder days. That tells me I picked a good year to sit out the winter and have a child.

Let the fisking begin:

Climate change threatens California water supply

BERKELEY, California (Reuters) - California's tallest mountain range, the Sierra Nevada, may lose nearly all its snowpack by the end of the century, threatening a water crisis in the nation's most populous state, a leading scientist and Nobel laureate said.

Here we are in 2007. We know for a fact that over the course of the next 93 years, we may (or may not) lose nearly all of the Sierra Nevada snowpack. Christmas might be cancelled, too.

California could lose 30 percent to 70 percent of the snowpack to the ills of greenhouse gases and global warming, Steven Chu, director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the 1997 winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics, told Reuters.

A Nobel Prize in Physics is truly impressive. That is something I probably could not hope to achieve in 3 lifetimes. But how does this make him an expert on climate change? In fairness I looked up Dr. Chu's bio, and he is currently pushing his scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory to develop technologies to reverse climate change. It seems to me the reverse of climate change must be climate un-change. THAT is truly unprecedented! I am left to believe that Dr. Chu feels that before man came along and started belching C02 the climate was static.
George Orwell was right: some things are so stupid that you have to be an intellectual to believe them.

A "bad scenario" of atmospheric carbon could mean the loss of 70 percent to 93 percent, Chu said in an interview, citing published climate models.

I wonder to which "published climate models" Dr. Chu refers? I hope it's not this one.

Water levels in the snowpack now are at 29 percent of normal, the lowest in 20 years, and water districts are pleading for conservation and more storage to counter future dry years.

I'm definitely in favor of water conservation all the time. I remember the California drought from 1976 to 1978 where we were only allowed to flush the toilet once per day. That was one flush per household. Stinky? You betcha! Back then though I believe the culprit was Global Cooling. But I digress...

I give you the following from an article published in May of 2006. That would be one year ago almost to the day.

MOUNT ROSE -- Two men groaned and gasped Tuesday as they pulled a long, hollow metal pole from the snow near the 10,880-foot summit of Mount Rose, 20 miles southwest of Reno.

While a couple dozen people watched, one of the men measured the depth of the snow, weighed the sample that was pulled up inside the pole and then consulted his charts.

"It's looking good," said Dan Greenlee, the snow survey program manager for the Reno office of the Natural Resources Conservation Service. "Seventy-two inches of water. Fifteen feet of snow. I would consider this a drought-buster. Lake Tahoe is going to come close to filling."

The crowd, mainly federal government bureaucrats from Washington, hooted in approval. Greenlee excitedly explained the snowpack is 177 percent of normal for this time of the year and the fourth heaviest since they began measuring snow at the Mount Rose Ski Area site in 1981.

We notice that the snowpack is the fourth heaviest in the past 26 years. That means there were 3 even heavier snowpacks this time of year in the past 26 years. Nevermind that, Dr. Chu wants to focus on the fact that this winter is the lowest in the last 20 years. So we have a year that is 29 percent below normal on the heels of a winter where snowpack was 177 percent above normal. Somehow, this is alarming.

Back to the article.

Climate change may lead to more severe drought and higher flood peaks that could mean the loss of one-fourth of the snowpack by 2050, according to California's Department of Water Resources.

May lead to...could mean...
Let me get this straight. By the end of the century (as cited earlier) the snowpack could be almost completely gone. But by 2050, the snowpack could be 1/4 of what it is today. I wonder if that's 1/4 of 29% below normal, 1/4 of the average over some unmentioned time period, 0r the square root of 1/4 of pi r squared times the box office revenues of "An Inconvenient Truth"? And the Leisure Greenie crowd wonders why people like me refuse to submit to the "scientific community consensus".

"If I were emperor of the world, I would put the pedal to the floor on energy efficiency and conservation for the next decade," Chu said.

Indeed, one need not look too closely at the impetus behind the Green Revolution to see that there are many, many people that feel they should be emperor of the world.

Tackling energy waste in residential and commercial buildings is a high priority for Chu. He said new designs and technologies in that area could go a long way toward improving heating, ventilation and lighting systems and reducing energy consumption.

"Get rid of the wasteful habits and inefficiency and that by far and away will show the biggest gains in the short term," he said.

He's right about that. There's actually a program called LEED that certifies new buildings as environmentally friendly. That's a good thing ultimately. But I thought this article was about melting snowpacks?

Chu will oversee new energy programs at the Berkeley Lab under a program with London-based BP Plc, the third largest Western oil company, which has committed $500 million over 10 years to support a bioscience research institute to develop new biofuels for transportation.

BP is partnering with the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Illinois to develop new energy sources while improving the environment.

So it's about money afterall! Anybody in their right mind has to be in favor of discovering alternative energy sources, and if Big Oil is going to fund it that's fine with me. But it's rather ironic that on the one hand Dr. Chu is hyperventilating about carbon emissions and global warming and melting snowpack and on the other hand accepting money from one of the major contributors to this "catastrophe". Ah well, as long as he can sleep at night.

Here's a fun global warming quiz. Don't get too many right now ya hear? Al Gore might catch you and glue your eyes open and make you watch 100 continuous hours of his powerpoint presentation.

Tony Blair's Curtain Call

Today Britain's Prime Minister Tony Blair announced he'd be retiring on June 27th after 10 years of service. He's been called Bush's "lap dog", a "poodle" and a host of other names by the passive/aggressive-utopian/pacifist crowd for stating after the Sept 11th attacks that it was right to, "stand shoulder to shoulder with our oldest ally, and I did so out of belief."

He was a great orator in the British tradition. This speech given in March of 2006 and titled, "Why We Fight On" demonstrates this point aptly.

Here are a few excerpts

On Globalization:

The basic thesis is that the defining characteristic of today's world is its interdependence; that whereas the economics of globalisation are well matured, the politics of globalisation are not; and that unless we articulate a common global policy based on common values, we risk chaos threatening our stability, economic and political, through letting extremism, conflict or injustice go unchecked.

The consequence of this thesis is a policy of engagement not isolation; and one that is active not reactive.

Confusingly, its proponents and opponents come from all sides of the political spectrum. So it is apparently a "neo-conservative" ie right wing view, to be ardently in favour of spreading democracy round the world; whilst others on the right take the view that this is dangerous and deluded - the only thing that matters is an immediate view of national interest. Some progressives see intervention as humanitarian and necessary; others take the view that provided dictators don't threaten our citizens directly, what they do with their own, is up to them.

The debate on world trade has thrown all sides into an orgy of political cross-dressing. Protectionist sentiment is rife on the left; on the right, there are calls for "economic patriotism"; meanwhile some voices left and right, are making the case for free trade not just on grounds of commerce but of justice.

The true division in foreign policy today is between: those who want the shop "open", or those who want it "closed"; those who believe that the long-term interests of a country lie in it being out there, engaged, interactive and those who think the short-term pain of such a policy and its decisions, too great. This division has strong echoes in debates not just over foreign policy and trade but also over immigration.

Progressives may implement policy differently from conservatives, but the fault lines are the same.

Where progressive and conservative policy can differ is that progressives are stronger on the challenges of poverty, climate change and trade justice. I have no doubt at all it is impossible to gain support for our values, unless the demand for justice is as strong as the demand for freedom; and the willingness to work in partnership with others is an avowed preference to going it alone, even if that may sometimes be necessary.

On Global Terrorism:

It is in confronting global terrorism today that the sharpest debate and disagreement is found. Nowhere is the supposed "folly" of the interventionist case so loudly trumpeted as in this case. Here, so it is said, as the third anniversary of the Iraq conflict takes place, is the wreckage of such a world view. Under Saddam Iraq was "stable". Now its stability is in the balance. Ergo, it should never have been done.

This is essentially the product of the conventional view of foreign policy since the fall of the Berlin Wall. This view holds that there is no longer a defining issue in foreign policy. Countries should therefore manage their affairs and relationships according to their narrow national interests. The basic posture represented by this view is: not to provoke, to keep all as settled as it can be and cause no tectonic plates to move. It has its soft face in dealing with issues like global warming or Africa; and reserves its hard face only if directly attacked by another state, which is unlikely. It is a view which sees the world as not without challenge but basically calm, with a few nasty things lurking in deep waters, which it is best to avoid; but no major currents that inevitably threaten its placid surface. It believes the storms have been largely self-created.

This is the majority view of a large part of western opinion, certainly in Europe. According to this opinion, the policy of America since 9/11 has been a gross overreaction; George Bush is as much if not more of a threat to world peace as Osama bin Laden; and what is happening in Iraq, Afghanistan or anywhere else in the Middle East, is an entirely understandable consequence of US/UK imperialism or worse, of just plain stupidity. Leave it all alone or at least treat it with sensitivity and it would all resolve itself in time; "it" never quite being defined, but just generally felt as anything that causes disruption.

This world view - which I would characterise as a doctrine of benign inactivity - sits in the commentator's seat, almost as a matter of principle. It has imposed a paradigm on world events that is extraordinary in its attraction and its scope. As we speak, Iraq is facing a crucial moment in its history: to unify and progress, under a government elected by its people for the first time in half a century; or to descend into sectarian strife, bringing a return to certain misery for millions. In Afghanistan, the same life choice for a nation, is being played out. And in many Arab and Muslim states, similar, though less publicised, struggles for democracy dominate their politics.

The effect of this paradigm is to see each setback in Iraq or Afghanistan, each revolting terrorist barbarity, each reverse for the forces of democracy or advance for the forces of tyranny as merely an illustration of the foolishness of our ever being there; as a reason why Saddam should have been left in place or the Taliban free to continue their alliance with Al Qaida. Those who still justify the interventions are treated with scorn.

Then, when terrorists strike in the nations like Britain or Spain, who supported such action, there is a groundswell of opinion formers keen to say, in effect, that it's hardly surprising - after all, if we do this to "their" countries, is it any wonder they do it to "ours"?

So the statement that Iraq or Afghanistan or Palestine or indeed Chechnya, Kashmir or half a dozen other troublespots is seen by extremists as fertile ground for their recruiting - a statement of the obvious - is elided with the notion that we have "caused" such recruitment or made terrorism worse, a notion that, on any sane analysis, has the most profound implications for democracy.

On Domestic Terrorism:

There is an interesting debate going on inside government today about how to counter extremism in British communities. Ministers have been advised never to use the term "Islamist extremist". It will give offence. It is true. It will. There are those - perfectly decent-minded people - who say the extremists who commit these acts of terrorism are not true Muslims. And, of course, they are right. They are no more proper Muslims than the Protestant bigot who murders a Catholic in Northern Ireland is a proper Christian. But, unfortunately, he is still a "Protestant" bigot. To say his religion is irrelevant is both completely to misunderstand his motive and to refuse to face up to the strain of extremism within his religion that has given rise to it.

Yet, in respect of radical Islam, the paradigm insists that to say what is true, is to provoke, to show insensitivity, to demonstrate the same qualities of purblind ignorance that leads us to suppose that Muslims view democracy or liberty in the same way we do.

Just as it lets go unchallenged the frequent refrain that it is to be expected that Muslim opinion will react violently to the invasion of Iraq: after all it is a Muslim country. Thus, the attitude is: we understand your sense of grievance; we acknowledge your anger at the invasion of a Muslim country; but to strike back through terrorism is wrong.

It is a posture of weakness, defeatism and most of all, deeply insulting to every Muslim who believes in freedom ie the majority. Instead of challenging the extremism, this attitude panders to it and therefore instead of choking it, feeds its growth.

None of this means, incidentally, that the invasion of Iraq or Afghanistan was right; merely that it is nonsense to suggest it was done because the countries are Muslim.

I recall the video footage of Mohammed Sadiq Khan, the man who was the ringleader of the 7/7 bombers. There he was, complaining about the suppression of Muslims, the wickedness of America and Britain, calling on all fellow Muslims to fight us. And I thought: here is someone, brought up in this country, free to practise his religion, free to speak out, free to vote, with a good standard of living and every chance to raise a family in a decent way of life, talking about "us", the British, when his whole experience of "us" has been the very opposite of the message he is preaching. And in so far as he is angry about Muslims in Iraq or Afghanistan let Iraqi or Afghan Muslims decide whether to be angry or not by ballot.

There was something tragic, terrible but also ridiculous about such a diatribe. He may have been born here. But his ideology wasn't. And that is why it has to be taken on, everywhere.

This terrorism will not be defeated until its ideas, the poison that warps the minds of its adherents, are confronted, head-on, in their essence, at their core. By this I don't mean telling them terrorism is wrong. I mean telling them their attitude to America is absurd; their concept of governance pre-feudal; their positions on women and other faiths, reactionary and regressive; and then since only by Muslims can this be done: standing up for and supporting those within Islam who will tell them all of this but more, namely that the extremist view of Islam is not just theologically backward but completely contrary to the spirit and teaching of the Koran.

But in order to do this, we must reject the thought that somehow we are the authors of our own distress; that if only we altered this decision or that, the extremism would fade away. The only way to win is: to recognise this phenomenon is a global ideology; to see all areas, in which it operates, as linked; and to defeat it by values and ideas set in opposition to those of the terrorists.

On the struggle between democracy and violence:

People look back on the three years since the Iraq conflict; they point to the precarious nature of Iraq today and to those who have died - mainly in terrorist acts - and they say: how can it have been worth it?

But there is a different question to ask: why is it so important to the forces of reaction and violence to halt Iraq in its democratic tracks and tip it into sectarian war? Why do foreign terrorists from Al Qaida and its associates go across the border to kill and maim? Why does Syria not take stronger action to prevent them? Why does Iran meddle so furiously in the stability of Iraq?

Examine the propaganda poured into the minds of Arabs and Muslims. Every abuse at Abu Ghraib is exposed in detail; of course it is unacceptable but it is as if the only absence of due process in that part of the world is in prisons run by the Americans. Every conspiracy theory - from seizing Iraqi oil to imperial domination - is largely dusted down and repeated.

Why? The answer is that the reactionary elements know the importance of victory or defeat in Iraq. Right from the beginning, to them it was obvious. For sure, errors were made on our side. It is arguable that de-Baathification went too quickly and was spread too indiscriminately, especially amongst the armed forces. Though in parenthesis, the real worry, back in 2003 was a humanitarian crisis, which we avoided; and the pressure was all to de-Baathify faster.

On the past, and the future:

What happens in Iraq or Afghanistan today is not just crucial for the people in those countries or even in those regions; but for our security here and round the world. It is a cause that has none of the debatable nature of the decisions to go for regime change; it is an entirely noble one - to help people in need of our help in pursuit of liberty; and a self-interested one, since in their salvation lies our own security.

Naturally, the debate over the wisdom of the original decisions, especially in respect of Iraq will continue. Opponents will say Iraq was never a threat; there were no WMD; the drug trade in Afghanistan continues. I will point out Iraq was indeed a threat as two regional wars, 14 UN resolutions and the final report of the Iraq Survey Group show; that in the aftermath of the Iraq War we secured major advances on WMD not least the new relationship with Libya and the shutting down of the AQ Khan network; and that it was the Taliban who manipulated the drug trade and in any event housed Al Qaida and its training camps.

But whatever the conclusion to this debate, if there ever is one, the fact is that now, whatever the rights and wrongs of how and why Saddam and the Taliban were removed, there is an obvious, clear and overwhelming reason for supporting the people of those countries in their desire for democracy.

There's plenty in this speech to take issue with when read in it's entirety. Afterall, Mr. Blair is still a politican who is capable of speaking out of both sides of his mouth simultaenously. I just think it's a shame that we do not have anybody in our government capable of speaking with such grace and fluidity.

Enjoy your retirement Mr. Blair.

Put Your Money Where Your Greenhouse Gas-Exhaling Mouth Is

I wonder what Al Gore thinks of these odds?

Online Gambling on Global Warming

NORFOLK, Va. (AP) - Think global warming will raise the oceans enough to submerge Cape Hatteras? Want to bet on it?

An online gambling service has started taking bets on global warming, including whether it can submerge some of the East Coast's top vacation spots.

The odds that Virginia's Cape Henry will be under water by 2015—200- to-1 at BetUs.com. Its odds for Cape Hatteras flooding by the same date—300-to-1.

Don't bet on it, says Phil Roehrs, a coastal engineer for the city of Virginia Beach. Roehrs said although sea levels are rising along the East Coast, scientists are not predicting anywhere near the levels and dates provided by the gambling service.

"No wonder the odds are so good," Roehrs said.

That hasn't stopped bettors from taking a chance. About 3,000 placed bets during the first three days on online booking, said Reed Richards, a spokesman for BetUs.com.

Most gamblers on the site have put down money that Manhattan will be submerged before New Year's Eve 2011.

"Don't ask me why," Richards said.

Should be easy money for the Global Warming doomsdayers. They could purchase so many carbon credits with their winnings that maybe Toyota would name a hybrid model after them.

The Green Side of the Sub-Prime Meltdown

Equifax recently announced the latest mortgage default levels: a record 2.87% nationally in the first quarter, with deliquency rates up in 44 of 50 states. Yet somehow, I don't think these particular sub-prime borrowers were in any danger of not meeting their mortgage obligations:

California is in the midst of a major boom in large-scale marijuana cultivation operations run from inside homes, with authorities confiscating more than $100 million worth of pot in the last year alone, including in a series of recent raids in the suburbs of Los Angeles.

Officials with the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration say the number of indoor marijuana plants seized by federal, state and local authorities in California has quadrupled in just the last three years, from at least 54,000 plants to nearly 200,000 in 2006.

Many of those seizures have occurred in middle-class and upscale suburbs, where the pot growers took advantage of cheap home financing — and minimal credit checks — to purchase homes and remodel them into sophisticated farms, authorities said.

Our government may be engaged in any number of pointless wars at any period in time. Many would argue that Iraq is the most pointless at the moment, though I would argue that distinction should go to the War on Drugs, specifically the war on marijuana. Aside from the billions spent each year trying to eradicate a weed that grows just about anywhere, think of the ecological damage done by growers who have no regard for the land that produces their bounty:

The discovery of 22,740 marijuana plants growing in and around Point Reyes National Seashore last week wasn't only the biggest pot seizure ever made in Marin County. It was an environmental mess that will take several months and tens of thousands of dollars to clean up.

The crops seized on the steep hillsides overlooking Highway 1 were planted by sophisticated growers who cleared vegetation, terraced land, drew water from streams through miles of irrigation hoses and doused acres of land with hundreds of pounds of fertilizer and pesticides.

Such operations are turning up in greater numbers within state and national parks throughout California. Federal officials estimate the state produces half of all the marijuana seized on public lands nationwide.

Officials at Point Reyes National Seashore have only begun to assess the resulting damage to an area that is habitat for the spotted owl, steelhead trout and coho salmon, and they said it could be months before they know the long-term implications for the ecosystem.

The District Attorney of Mendocino County has it right:

The District Attorney has determined that the following guidelines will be used when making a decision to file charges: 1) Each person so qualified will be allowed to cultivate a one-hundred (100) square foot canopy of mature female cannabis plants, regardless of the number of marijuana plants; 2) Each person so qualified will be allowed two pounds of processed marijuana in their possession. Persons exceeding these guidelines will not necessarily be prosecuted but will receive close review.

Legalize it, tax it, and pour the resources into real problems that don't involve what an adult chooses to put into their body by their own free will.

The Trouble With Islam

Here's an excellent piece written by a former member of the Indonesian terrorist group Jemaah Islamiya.

The tendency of many Westerners to restrict themselves to self-criticism further obstructs reformation in Islam. Americans demonstrate against the war in Iraq, yet decline to demonstrate against the terrorists who kidnap innocent people and behead them. Similarly, after the Madrid train bombings, millions of Spanish citizens demonstrated against their separatist organization, ETA. But once the demonstrators realized that Muslims were behind the terror attacks they suspended the demonstrations. This example sent a message to radical Islamists to continue their violent methods.

These "progressives" frequently cite the need to examine "root causes." In this they are correct: Terrorism is only the manifestation of a disease and not the disease itself. But the root-causes are quite different from what they think. As a former member of Jemaah Islamiya, a group led by al Qaeda's second in command, Ayman al-Zawahiri, I know firsthand that the inhumane teaching in Islamist ideology can transform a young, benevolent mind into that of a terrorist. Without confronting the ideological roots of radical Islam it will be impossible to combat it. While there are many ideological "rootlets" of Islamism, the main tap root has a name--Salafism, or Salafi Islam, a violent, ultra-conservative version of the religion.

The Western Left does not realize the extent to which they enable and encourage those that would destroy the very civilization that supports their right to destroy their own civilization.

So you wanna party like a Rockstar, do ya?

Do you have what it takes?

LONDON (AP) - Keith Richards has acknowledged consuming a raft of illegal substances in his time, but this may top them all.

In comments published Tuesday, the 63-year-old Rolling Stones guitarist said he had snorted his father's ashes mixed with cocaine.

"The strangest thing I've tried to snort? My father. I snorted my father," Richards was quoted as saying by British music magazine NME.

"He was cremated and I couldn't resist grinding him up with a little bit of blow. My dad wouldn't have cared," he said. "... It went down pretty well, and I'm still alive."

Richards' father, Bert, died in 2002, at 84.

Richards, one of rock's legendary wild men, told the magazine that his survival was the result of luck, and advised young musicians against trying to emulate him.

"I did it because that was the way I did it. Now people think it's a way of life," he was quoted as saying.

"I've no pretensions about immortality," he added. "I'm the same as everyone ... just kind of lucky.

"I was No. 1 on the `who's likely to die' list for 10 years. I mean, I was really disappointed when I fell off the list," Richards said.

And that, friends, is why the Rolling Stones are in a class all by themselves.

10 Reasons You Are Not Rich...

Unless you are, then you can please disregard this post and get back to livin' la vida loca...!

link

The reason why you aren't a millionaire (or on your way to becoming one) is really quite simple. You probably assume it's because you aren't earning enough money, but the truth is that for most people, whether or not you become a millionaire has very little to do with the amount of money you make. It's the way that you treat money in your daily life.

Here are 10 possible reasons you aren't a millionaire:

1. You Care What Your Neighbors Think: If you're competing against them and their material possessions, you're wasting your hard-earned money on toys to impress them instead of building your wealth.

2. You Aren't Patient: Until the era of credit cards, it was difficult to spend more than you had. That is not the case today. If you have credit card debt because you couldn't wait until you had enough money to purchase something in cash, you are making others wealthy while keeping yourself in debt.

3. You Have Bad Habits: Whether it's smoking, drinking, gambling or some other bad habit, the habit is using up a lot of money that could go toward building wealth. Most people don't realize that the cost of their bad habits extends far beyond the immediate cost. Take smoking, for example: It costs a lot more than the pack of cigarettes purchased. It also negatively affects your wealth in the form of higher insurance rates and decreased value of your home.

4. You Have No Goals: It's difficult to build wealth if you haven't taken the time to know what you want. If you haven't set wealth goals, you aren't likely to attain them. You need to do more than state, "I want to be a millionaire." You need to take the time to set saving and investing goals on a yearly basis and come up with a plan for how to achieve those goals.

5. You Haven't Prepared: Bad things happen to the best of people from time to time, and if you haven't prepared for such a thing to happen to you through insurance, any wealth that you might have built can be gone in an instant.

6. You Try to Make a Quick Buck: For the vast majority of us, wealth doesn't come instantly. You may believe that people winning the lottery are a dime a dozen, but the truth is you're far more likely to get struck by lightning than win the lottery. This desire to get rich quickly likely extends into the way you invest, with similar results.

7. You Rely on Others to Take Care of Your Money: You believe that others have more knowledge about money matters, and you rely exclusively on their judgment when deciding where you should invest your money. Unfortunately, most people want to make money themselves, and this is their primary objective when they tell you how to invest your money. Listen to other people's advice to get new ideas, but in the end you should know enough to make your own investing decisions.

8. You Invest in Things You Don't Understand: Your hear that Bob has made a lot of money doing it, and you want to get in on the gravy train. If Bob really did make money, he did so because he understood how the investment worked. Throwing in your money because someone else has made money without fully understanding how the investment works will keep you from being wealthy.

9. You're Financially Afraid: You are so scared of risk that you keep all your money in a savings account that is actually losing money when inflation is put into the equation, yet you refuse to move it to a place where higher rates of return are possible because you're afraid that you will lose money.

10. You Ignore Your Finances: You take the attitude that if you make enough, the finances will take care of themselves. If you currently have debt, it will somehow resolve itself in the future. Unfortunately, it takes planning to become wealthy. It doesn't magically happen to the vast majority of people.

In reality, it is probably not just one of the above bad habits that has kept you from becoming a millionaire, but a combination of a few of them. Take a hard look at the list, and do some reflecting. If you want to be a millionaire, it's well within your power, but you'll have to face the issues that are currently keeping you from creating that wealth before you will have a chance to call yourself one.