Raw Consciousness

MY LIFE - think think think...

From CNN, they had this attributed to Bin Laden's tape:

He underscored it was U.S. foreign policy that led to the 9/11 attacks, saying, "Bush says and claims, that we hate freedom, let him tell us then, 'Why did we not attack Sweden?'"

Whatever feelings you may have about the Sep 11 attack, let me say that I also don't believe that Bin Ladden & company attacked us just because they "are jealous of us" or "are simply evil" or whatever- as many people react in knee jerk fashion.

Mind you, I am not a Bin Laden follower or such thing- nor do I want to be. What I want to point out, is the need to THINK. We need to think why what happened happened, and how we can reallly eliminate it from happening again. I am not advocating "bending over" to Al Qeada or any such silly thing. I am advocating a dire long overdue need of revising US foreign policy.

MY LIFE - Bin Laden comments on Bush's incompetence...

This was mentioned as part of this new Bin Laden tape - from the New York Times:

Mr. bin Laden said Mr. Bush reacted slowly to the Sept. 11 attacks as they were occurring, giving the hijackers more time than they expected to carry out the plot. At the time of the attacks, the president was visiting a group of second graders at an elementary school in Sarasota, Fla., holding a book called "My Pet Goat."

"It never occurred to us that the commander in chief of the American armed forces would leave 50,000 of his citizens in the two towers to face these horrors alone," Mr. bin Laden said, referring to estimates of the number of people who might have been at the World Trade Center.

Referring to the president, Mr. bin Laden said: "It appeared to him that a little girl's talk about her goat and its butting was more important than the planes and their butting of the skyscrapers. That gave us three times the required time to carry out the operations, thank God."

I don't think it ever occurred to any of us either.

MY LIFE - Remember to vote!

I just found the location where I am going to go to vote. If you live in California, here's a useful link to find out where you need to vote.

http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/elections_ppl.htm

REMEMBER: YOUR VOTE IS VERY IMPORTANT. WE CAN'T HAVE 4 MORE YEARS OF BUSH!

DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY - Some outdoor photos...

Well it wasn't raining today and I had to get out of my house... so here's some shots taken with my Lumix FZ20 camera... (click on the thumbnail for a bigger photo).

Comments welcome!

MY LIFE - Bush relatives for John Kerry?

It this true???

http://www.bushrelativesforkerry.com/pages/1/index.htm

I would like to know..... before I dance in happiness...

DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY - Panasonic Lumix FZ20...

Yup, I could not resist and bought one of those relatively new Panasonic Lumix FZ20... highlights are 12x optical zoom, *very* good lens (low CA's), aperture @ 2.8 throught *entire zoom* range, image stabilized lens, 5 megapixels, "mid-size" and relatively good price (US $600 and dropping already).

Here are some shots I took today with it:

This one was yesterday:

The black and white moon shoot looks "glamoury" because there were some clouds... By the way, I still love my Fuji F710 so I am not getting rid of it or its use. This is more of a "companion, higher end" camera. Though ironically, the F710 still has more dynamic range and is overall faster!

- Raist

MY LIFE - Reagan's case against Bush...

I found this by looking at my now a couple of months old gmail account, sent by Bman. Sorry! Now I finally was able to log back in. This is pretty good!

From Equire, September 2004

"The Case Against George W. Bush"

Enjoy.

MY LIFE- gas....

Anybody else noticed Gas prices seem to be getting out of control?

It's $2.62 for the "high end" were I live now and the low end seems to be a super high $2.35-$2.42

- Raist