mordant wit

What is the purpose of human life on this planet? Why do we exist? What purpose does God achieve in having humans inhabit this planet?

Ford Motor Co. is recalling nearly 800,000 pickups and sport utility vehicles because the cruise control switch could short circuit and cause a fire under the hood, the nation's second biggest automaker said Thursday.


The recall affects approximately 792,000 Ford F-150 pickups, Ford Expeditions and Lincoln Navigators from the 2000 model year. Also affected are 2001 F-Series Supercrew trucks that were made at the same time.


Ford will notify owners of the recall in February, and dealers will deactivate the cruise control switch for free. Once the company has an adequate supply of replacement switches, it will send another letter notifying owners that they can get their switches replaced.


Complete story here

Artist Jackson Pollock was born on this date in 1912. Pollock was famous for his technique of splattering and pouring paint on the canvas, rather than using more traditional painting tools.

"Abstract painting is abstract. It confronts you. There was a reviewer a while back who wrote that my pictures didn't have any beginning or any end. He didn't mean it as a compliment, but it was." ~ Jackson Pollock

Amazon.com Inc. launched a local Internet search service on Wednesday that allows users to virtually walk streets and see photos of businesses, a move that could help it better compete with established search providers such as Google Inc.

The local "Yellow Pages" service from Amazon unit A9.com Inc. marks the first major addition to the A9 search engine launched in September.

Other Internet search companies, such as Google, Yahoo Inc. and Ask Jeeves Inc., have already rolled out local search services as a way to boost advertising revenues, traffic and market share.

A9's so-called block view allows users to see storefronts and virtually stroll the streets of 10 cities, including New York, Los Angeles and San Francisco, where the company has collected more than 20 million photographs.


Complete story here

Carly Fiorina, the CEO of Hewlett Packard, recently gave a speech defining the relevance of leadership in today's world. Here is the quote from the final part of her speech.

"I'll end by telling a story.

There was once a civilization that was the greatest in the world.

It was able to create a continental super-state that stretched from ocean to ocean, and from northern climes to tropics and deserts. Within its dominion lived hundreds of millions of people, of different creeds and ethnic origins.

One of its languages became the universal language of much of the world, the bridge between the peoples of a hundred lands. Its armies were made up of people of many nationalities, and its military protection allowed a degree of peace and prosperity that had never been known. The reach of this civilization's commerce extended from Latin America to China, and everywhere in between.

And this civilization was driven more than anything, by invention. Its architects designed buildings that defied gravity. Its mathematicians created the algebra and algorithms that would enable the building of computers, and the creation of encryption. Its doctors examined the human body, and found new cures for disease. Its astronomers looked into the heavens, named the stars, and paved the way for space travel and exploration.

Its writers created thousands of stories. Stories of courage, romance and magic. Its poets wrote of love, when others before them were too steeped in fear to think of such things.

When other nations were afraid of ideas, this civilization thrived on them, and kept them alive. When censors threatened to wipe out knowledge from past civilizations, this civilization kept the knowledge alive, and passed it on to others.

While modern Western civilization shares many of these traits, the civilization I'm talking about was the Islamic world from the year 800 to 1600, which included the Ottoman Empire and the courts of Baghdad, Damascus and Cairo, and enlightened rulers like Suleiman the Magnificent.

Although we are often unaware of our indebtedness to this other civilization, its gifts are very much a part of our heritage. The technology industry would not exist without the contributions of Arab mathematicians. Sufi poet-philosophers like Rumi challenged our notions of self and truth. Leaders like Suleiman contributed to our notions of tolerance and civic leadership.

And perhaps we can learn a lesson from his example: It was leadership based on meritocracy, not inheritance. It was leadership that harnessed the full capabilities of a very diverse population–that included Christianity, Islamic, and Jewish traditions.

This kind of enlightened leadership — leadership that nurtured culture, sustainability, diversity and courage — led to 800 years of invention and prosperity.

In dark and serious times like this, we must affirm our commitment to building societies and institutions that aspire to this kind of greatness. More than ever, we must focus on the importance of leadership– bold acts of leadership and decidedly personal acts of leadership."


For the full speech, please go to:
http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/execteam/speeches/fiorina/minnesota01.html

WOW! This has been a long absence. My blog must be lonely without me. As if!

Well... too much has been going on in my life because of which i wasn't able to put up anything here. Now I think I'd be able to do something about it. Lets see if it starts happening...

And you open the door and you step inside
Where inside our hearts
Now imagine your pain as a white ball of healing light
That's right, your pain
The pain itself is a white ball of healing light
I don't think so

This is your life, good to the last drop
Doesn't get any better than this
This is your life and it's ending one minute at a time

This isn't a seminar, this isn't a weekend retreat
Where you are now you can't even imagine what the bottom will be like
Only after disaster can we be resurrected
It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything
Nothing is static, everything is evolving, everything is falling apart

This is your life, this is your life, this is your life, this is your life
Doesn't get any better than this
This is your life, this is your life, this is your life, this is your life
And it and it's ending one-minute at a time

You are not a beautiful and unique snowflake
You are the same decaying organic matter as everything else
We are all part of the same compost heap
We are the all singing, all dancing, crap of the world

You are not your bank account
You are not the clothes you wear
You are not the contents of your wallet
You are not your bowel cancer
You are not your grande latte
You are not the car you drive
You are not your fucking khaki's

You have to give up, you have to give up
You have to realize that someday you will die
Until you know that, you are useless

I say let me never be complete
I say may I never be content
I say deliver me from Swedish furniture
I say deliver me from clever arts
I say deliver me from clear skin and perfect teeth
I say you have to give up
I say evolve, and let the chips fall where they may

This is your life, this is your life, this is your life, this is your life
Doesn't get any better than this
This is your life, this is your life, this is your life, this is your life
And it and it's ending one-minute at a time

You have to give up, you have to give up
I want you to hit me as hard as you can
I want you to hit me as hard as you can

Welcome to Fight Club
If this is your first night, you have to fight

The fox and the leopard were having a beauty contest. The leopard boasted constantly about the marvellous variety of his coat.

The fox replied:

"How much more beautiful I am than you! For I am varied not merely in my body, but in my soul!"

Is it conceivable that Al Qaeda, as defined by President Bush as the center of a vast and well-organized international terrorist conspiracy, does not exist?

To even raise the question amid all the officially inspired hysteria is heretical, especially in the context of the US media's supine acceptance of Administration claims relating to national security. Yet a brilliant new BBC film produced by one of Britain's leading documentary filmmakers systematically challenges this and many other accepted articles of faith in the so-called war on terror.

The Power of Nightmares: The Rise of the Politics of Fear, a three-hour historical film by Adam Curtis recently aired by the British Broadcasting Corp., argues coherently that much of what we have been told about the threat of international terrorism "is a fantasy that has been exaggerated and distorted by politicians. It is a dark illusion that has spread unquestioned through governments around the world, the security services and the international media."

Stern stuff, indeed. But consider just a few of the many questions the program poses along the way:
§ If Osama bin Laden does, in fact, head a vast international terrorist organization with trained operatives in more than forty countries, as claimed by Bush, why, despite torture of prisoners, has this Administration failed to produce hard evidence of it?
§ How can it be that in Britain since 9/11, 664 people have been detained on suspicion of terrorism but only seventeen have been found guilty, most of them with no connection to Islamist groups and none who were proven members of Al Qaeda?
§ Why have we heard so much frightening talk about "dirty bombs" when experts say it is panic rather than radioactivity that would kill people?
§ Why did Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld claim on Meet the Press in 2001 that Al Qaeda controlled massive high-tech cave complexes in Afghanistan, when British and US military forces later found no such thing?

Of course, the documentary does not doubt that an embittered, well-connected and wealthy Saudi man named Osama bin Laden helped finance various affinity groups of Islamist fanatics that have engaged in terror, including the 9/11 attacks. Nor does it challenge the notion that a terrifying version of fundamentalist Islam has led to gruesome spates of violence throughout the world. But the film, both more sober and more deeply provocative than Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11, directly challenges the conventional wisdom by making a powerful case that the Bush Administration, led by a tight-knit cabal of Machiavellian neoconservatives, has seized upon the false image of a unified international terrorist threat to replace the expired Soviet empire in order to push a political agenda.

Terrorism is deeply threatening, but it appears to be a much more fragmented and complex phenomenon than the octopus-network image of Al Qaeda, with bin Laden as its head, would suggest.

While the BBC documentary acknowledges that the threat of terrorism is both real and growing, it disagrees that the threat is centralized:

"There are dangerous and fanatical individuals and groups around the world who have been inspired by extreme Islamist ideas and who will use the techniques of mass terror--the attacks on America and Madrid make this only too clear. But the nightmare vision of a uniquely powerful hidden organization waiting to strike our societies is an illusion. Wherever one looks for this Al Qaeda organization, from the mountains of Afghanistan to the 'sleeper cells' in America, the British and Americans are chasing a phantom enemy."

The fact is, despite the efforts of several government commissions and a vast army of investigators, we still do not have a credible narrative of a "war on terror" that is being fought in the shadows.

Consider, for example, that neither the 9/11 commission nor any court of law has been able to directly take evidence from the key post-9/11 terror detainees held by the United States. Everything we know comes from two sides that both have a great stake in exaggerating the threat posed by Al Qaeda: the terrorists themselves and the military and intelligence agencies that have a vested interest in maintaining the facade of an overwhelmingly dangerous enemy.
Such a state of national ignorance about an endless war is, as The Power of Nightmares makes clear, simply unacceptable in a functioning democracy.


Actual story here.

Asia's Deadly Waves

Aight. So everything is being done online now. Air reservations. Doctor's Opinions. Nikah's. Bank Statements...

Ohh yea... don't feel weird... nikah's too

Here's one for example


thanx Chats

do you worry that you're not liked
how long till you break
you're happy cause you smile
but how much can you fake
an ordinary boy an ordinary name
but ordinary's just not good enough today

alone I'm thinking
why is superman dead
is it in my head
we'll just laugh instead
you worry about the weather and
whether or not you should hate

are you worried about your faith
kneel down and obey
you're happy you're in love
you need someone to hate
an ordinary girl an ordinary waist
but ordinary's just not good enough today

doesn't anybody ever know that the
world's a subway...

When obscurity has devoured you and
The world is turning dreary
When none of your acts will transfigure your past
Nor will anything you articulate
When the forlorn hours of despondency
Are driving you round the bend
When the heavens don't gleam with stars anymore
When your friends don't discern you anymore
When nobody heeds for your endurance
When there are tears in your eyes
When you gaze into the mirror
And you feel curtailed
Because a certain sorrow in your mind
That you can't annihilate
Lingers along...
Don't fret...
Cause you're mine.
And I'll be there by you

One Day It Won'T Hurt So Much
hey ...its for yew
I live in fear that one day
I will go to bed
And not cry myself to sleep

That one night
I will not toss and turn
Dreaming of you
With me, together,
As it was meant to be

That one morning
I will not wake up and clutch
At the empty space beside me
And spend my first waking moment
Thinking fo you

But one day I will not cry myself to sleep
And one morning that space will not be empty
And for that I hate you
Almost a much as I love you

Dr Isa Daudpota, project leader, Centre for Frontier Technologies, Islamabad was fired from his job recently. Dr Daudpota has a Ph.D. from MIT, a prestigious American university, and has been a researcher at the US space agency, NASA. He has been writing on issues that concern raising the standard of science and education in Pakistan. His apparent sin was pointing out the phenomenon of fake degree in an article in Dawn's sister publication , the monthly Spider of November 2004. Apparently he ruffled some sensitive feathers and that led to the cancellation of his contract.

The sorry state of academics in general and of the sciences in particular Pakistan has often been highlighted in the media and is no hidden secret. Dr Ataur Rahman, an eminent scientist and researcher (and now chairman of the Higher Education Commission) has been in the forefront of the campaign for raising standards in science since the late 1980s.

The sorry state of science and technology is often attributed to the small number of doctorate degree holders. Hence, increasing the number of Ph.Ds is considered essential for raising standards and the HEC has launched an ambituous programme to do that.


Complete article here

Tsunamis are unlike waves formed by tides or surface winds. A tsunami radiates out in all directions from the epicenter of an undersea earthquake. It may hit nearby coastal areas in seconds, or it may travel thousands of miles across open seas before striking land.

On the open sea, away from shallow areas and coastlines, a tsunami is virtually undetectable, with waves that crest at less than 3 feet, and crests that may be separated by hundreds of miles. In fact, ships at sea are generally unaware that they are riding a tsunami, which is why there have been no reports of damage or distress from any cruise ship, freighter or other vessel at sea in the region. However, hundreds of pleasure boats and fishing boats close to shore or docked in marinas in areas hit by the tsunami have been destroyed.

A tsunami's speed is determined by the depth of the ocean, and this one moved at speeds in excess of 500 miles per hour as it raced toward Sri Lanka, India and Africa. Tsunamis cannot be seen from the air or sea until they enter shallow water. It is there that the tsunami slows dramatically, to 20 or 30 miles per hour, and begins to rise above sea level. This tsunami was most likely imperceptible in deep water, but it rose to a height of 20 to 40 feet before it slammed into shore.

Tsunamis drain the water away from the beach before they strike, and in some places, the water retreated hundreds of yards. There are eyewitness accounts from snorkelers who suddenly found themselves face down in wet sand or atop sharp coral.

Then the water began to rise in the distance, and a sound that has been described as being similar to a jet engine was heard. Beachgoers had at most a few minutes to run for higher ground by the time they heard this sound, but of course, few knew what to make of the signs until it was too late.

Tsunamis don't break like normal waves, they simply rise and careen forward. Wind-generated waves are typically 5 to 20 seconds apart, while tsunami waves may be separated by minutes or even hours. A tsunami will typically consist of 3 to 10 waves, and each wave can carry objects or people out to sea as it retreats.

More than 95% of the world's earthquakes occur beneath the Pacific Ocean, and early warning systems are in place to detect tsunamis that might threaten the Pacific Coast of the U.S., Alaska, Hawaii, and many Pacific Rim countries. No such system exists in the Indian Ocean, though governments there will surely go to the expense to deploy one now.

India, January 26, 2001 - A strong earthquake shook the Indian subcontinent on the morning of 26 January 2001, India's Republic Day. According to the Indian Meteorological Department (IMD), the magnitude of the earthquake was 6.9 on the Richter scale. The epicenter is located about 20-km north - east of Bhuj city in the State of Gujarat. The earthquake is reported to be the strongest, this region has experienced in the past 40 years.

India, December 26, 2004 - An 8.9-magnitude earthquake off the west coast of the northern Indonesian island of Sumatra set off massive tidal waves on Sunday morning (December 26), which slammed into coastal towns and villages across south and south east Asia, killing thousands of people.

The quake – is said to be the world's most powerful in 40 years - first struck at 7.59 a.m. with multiple tremors felt in the Andaman islands. The quake triggered tidal waves, which swept across the Indian Ocean, striking coastal regions of Sri Lanka, India, Indonesia, Thailand, Bangladesh and Malaysia.

Other earthquakes which occurred on “26” around the world:

Iran, December 26, 2003 - An earthquake measuring 6.5 on the Richter scale struck southeastern Iran on Friday killing around 40,000 plus people.

Japan, September 26, 2003 - A strong quake with a preliminary magnitude of 7.8 rocked the northern Japan island of Hokkaido early Friday.

North America, January 26, 1700 - An earthquake measuring 9.0 on the Richter scale struck Cascadian in N. America.

America, March 26, 1872 - An earthquake measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale struck Lone Pine in California, USA.

China, December 26, 1932 - An earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale struck Kansu in China killing 200,00 people.

China, December 26, 1932 - An earthquake measuring 7.6 on the Richter scale struck Gansu in China killing 70,00 people.

Turkey, December 26, 1939 - An earthquake measuring 7.8 on the Richter scale struck Erzincan in Turkey killing around 32,700 people.

China, July 26, 1976 - An earthquake measuring 7.5 on the Richter scale struck Tangshan in China killing 255,000+ people.

Portugal, January 26, 1951 - An earthquake struck Lisbon in Portugal killing 30,000 people.

H ours of happy times with friends and family
A bundant time for relaxation
P rosperity
P lenty of love when you need it the most
Y outhful excitement at lifes simple pleasures

N ights of restful slumber (dont' worry be happy)
E verything you need
W ishing you love and light

Y ears and years of good health
E njoyment and mirth
A angels to watch over you
R embrances of a happy years!