2008 ELECTION made easy...

Here's a short and sweet post, against the tide of recent long ZENramblings...

Michael Bloomberg, Mayor of New York City, announced this week his change of Party affiliation, reducing the number of multi-billionaire Republicants by exactly one.

As an 'independent' some voices claim that the man is ready to 'explore' his candidacy as a 3P (third-party) candidate for President.

And I wonder how this could happen, if he actually wins? Remember, he was a life-long Democrat, until he chose to run for mayor as a Republicant.

And remember a ZENfactoid: 122,293,332 people took a 2004 Presidential ballot (if we discount DIEBOLD machine-voting 'anomalies', stolen or lost votes from overseas, the usual hijinx).

So we could guess, that some 63,000,000 (or more) votes would win the next election.

The 2004 campaigns are estimated to have cost some $703 MILLION dollars, totally.

Giving for inflation, let's say that 65 million people would decide the next election (if we have one?!).

Let's say that the totals spent (very ummm, 'conservatively' estimated) could be 800 million.

This works out to about $12 per person...

Why don't we just start SELLING the presidency?

Bloomy! Man I got a deal for you: we're auctioning off the White House (aren't we? Ask your favorite Bushie-in-law, or CheneyFAN), it's between you and 'two others'...

How much would you bid?

Cash?

Ethics?

Just curiously...

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

IS America a LIE?

Or: What of America is TRUE?

This essay begins trying to explain how the American President has, and his lap-dog media can lie incessantly, brutally, harmfully about the state of the US government, the life of its citizens, and its external interventions.

Reference the statements made by General David Petraeus, as reported by the Washington Post in this article "Petraeus: Iraq 'Challenges' to Last for Years", such as:

"Conditions in Iraq will not improve sufficiently by September to justify a drawdown of U.S. military forces, the top commander in Iraq said yesterday."

So the ZENquestion remains, is America a LIE?

Is not a country the sum of its people and their shared beliefs? Americans believe their leaders, when they nickname augmented DEATHpower as 'Surge', and they trust their own judgment when media dogs and doggies tell them that the 'Surge' is temporary, a key implemented task that will allow future withdrawal.

The voices that rise, in opposition to such claims, are drowned in an avalanche of 'Support the Troops' mantras...

And those voices die, as did good Germans who objected to the rising centralizing powers conferred on Hitler, back in the mid-Thirties...

As long as Americans BELIEVE the LIE, they won't be in any position to help themselves off of the addiction: power, ruthless and lawless conquest and occupation, that defines America today.

What John Locke said is very important, in thinking about this subject. He spoke in the most eloquent way, of the innocence that had been America. In his Second Treatise on Civil Government, in the Fifth Section on Property, Section 49 we find the words that he made famous, and are so often today, misquoted or mis-cited:

"Thus in the beginning all the world was America, and more so than that is now; for no such thing as money was any where known. Find out something that hath the use and value of money amongst his neighbours, you shall see the same man will begin presently to enlarge his possessions."


He was referring to this concept of innocence, as a conclusion on the premises discussed in the preceding Section 48:

"And as different degrees of industry were apt to give men possessions in different proportions, so this invention of money gave them the opportunity to continue and enlarge them: for supposing an island, separate from all possible commerce with the rest of the world, wherein there were but an hundred families, but there were sheep, horses and cows, with other useful animals, wholsome fruits, and land enough for corn for a hundred thousand times as many, but nothing in the island, either because of its commonness, or perishableness, fit to supply the place of money; what reason could any one have there to enlarge his possessions beyond the use of his family, and a plentiful supply to its consumption, either in what their own industry produced, or they could barter for like perishable, useful commodities, with others? Where there is not some thing, both lasting and scarce, and so valuable to be hoarded up, there men will not be apt to enlarge their possessions of land, were it never so rich, never so free for them to take: for I ask, what would a man value ten thousand, or an hundred thousand acres of excellent land, ready cultivated, and well stocked too with cattle, in the middle of the inland parts of America, where he had no hopes of commerce with other parts of the world, to draw money to him by the sale of the product? It would not be worth the enclosing, and we should see him give up again to the wild common of nature, whatever was more than would supply the conveniencies of life to be had there for him and his family."


A land of bounteous natural beauty and resources. A land wherein REASON and LOGIC could begin to flourish; a land where Government could serve its people, rather than People forced to serve their Government.

But times have changed, and we who have helped to build America, sometimes close our eyes and wonder: what has it, what have WE wrought on our planet?

I was trying to explain to a new friend, a woman from Russia, that there was something in me that could NEVER strive to win a contest the prize for which was the destruction of our planet. This means: I live simply, ZENishly, with few demands and few encumbrances.

If this sounds like 'Commie swill' to you, take a breath.

I beg you to re-think one simple and accepted part of normal capitalist economics:
external costs.

"An externality is a cost or benefit resulting from an economic transaction that is borne or received by parties not directly involved in the transaction."

Yet! External costs DO NOT EXIST, per se (I believe that external benefits DO EXIST, btw):
every planetary decision bears a pricetag, and that pricetag may be sometimes too high.

Your factory pollutes: external cost?
Your car burns MY future food-processing and transportation processes: external cost?
Your ARMY kills my neighbors: external cost?

But there are no EXTERNAL COSTS.

There are present costs, and FUTURE COSTS.

As America continues to live its lie(s), it bestows unwanted, unrequested and incredibly harmful FUTURE COSTS on its grandchildren, its neighbors, and its soul.

I wanted to believe in America the Beautiful, I really did. But it's the lie that gets all of us.

No (major) political party is immune to these Lies.

Paraphrasing Locke:
"In the end, all the world will be America, and more so than that is now; for no such thing as peace was any where known. Find out something that hath the use of promoting peace amongst his neighbours, you shall see the same man will begin presently to enlarge his weapons."


COURAGE ...

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

Teva Mountain Games post-script...

ZENfriends, ZENreaders, welcome...

News around the world for me is centered on the Floyd Landis case, as regular readers are aware. Floyd has been enjoying some high-altitude hospitality in my ex-home town of Vail, Colorado, site of the TEVA Mountain Games.

However, here in the French-speaking side of Switzerland, one of our two free local morning papers from a couple days back, published a photo showing a woman standing along the roadside above Vail, in support of Floyd. She held two signs, one in each hand.

The first? “FREE FLOYD”
The second? “F**K the FRENCH”

If only she had added the words 'LAB' or 'PRESS' to the second, she'd have earned megaZENpoints...

In the small paragraph accompanying the photo, one could read that Floyd 'certainly has the supporters that he merits'.

In this sense the Suisse Romand (francophone region of this country with four national languages) publication parrots (as well may be expected) the venomous and blind devotion of the francophone world to walk in lock-step with their sister publication L'EQUIPE.

Any long-term readers of this blog will remember that ZEN is not a fan of the French sporting journal, long an embarrassment to and of itself, for its almost-impressive ability to destroy athletes' careers by receiving leaked confidential information on nearly every doping case around the world.

So the post that precedes this one, is an 'open letter' to Le Matin Bleu, in French, castigating them for their blind devotion to the WRONG side of this earth-shaking story.

Floyd was 'chewing' up the hillsides of Colorado last weekend, placing eighth as a participant in the Teva Mountain Games, held in my old town of Vail, Colorado. The road course that they use was my all-time favorite hill-climb (outside of Flagstaff Mountain Road above Boulder); it was also the scene of my worst accident to date (drunk rental-car employee driving over 110km/h)...

NB: do your 'FIND' command for Landis or Floyd! The Mountain bike course I have no idea... :-)

Twas also the road homeward for several beautiful months.


SHIFTING GEARS

Visual candy, the Gore Range mountains impose a majestic horizon, the first flat, straight kilometers rocket the riders past the Vail Golf Course, winding upward slowly from the East Vail interchange on what was once US Highway 6.

In closing my eyes, I still recall the many times I would turn a corner, surprising deer in groups of three, or seven, startled by the hardly-silent beast that huffed up, or swiftly spun downward, passing their grazing yet attentive stares.

Floyd's results in the hill Climb (he was eighth and 2'58" behind Ned Overend, a high-altitude rider who OWNS this race since I lived there in the 80s and 90s) reveal the state of his physical recuperation from his potentially career-ending surgery.

Floyd, who may or may not merit the form of attention that is rivetted on him nearly every day, unlike other TdF winners, donated his winnings to cancer victims: another quality he shares with the previous TdF winner Lance Armstrong.

As always, seeking justice, thank you for reading.


COURAGE ... to ethical Sports fans around the world!

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

Floyding Frenzy: Vail and the French TWIST...

Je vous écris, un peu fâché par la photo vous avez publié, d'une
supporter Américaine de Floyd Landis en Colorado, montrant
son amertume contre 'les Français'.

[veuillez m'excuser car mon français est d'origine 'Cowboy'!]

Je suis persuadé que votre fétiche, que vous partagez bien-sûr avec
tous les journaux francophones contre Floyd Landis, est aussi
malsain que le dopage dans le sport. Je ferais référence au journal
Parisien l'Equipe.

J'aimerais vous faire noter deux choses le concernant.

Le premier, c'est que aucune journal français, ou francophone, n'est
jamais s’interrogé, ni enquêté, à propos le soi-disant compétence
de ce LNDD (laboratoire national du dépistage du dopage), et ses
multiples incompétences professionnelles. Les preuves, pour moi,
sont dans ces faits mise au point par la 'litige' de Floyd sous les
couleurs de l'USADA, autant que ce labo français est dorénavant
“le département des analyses” : comme par changer son nom
c'est égal à une blanchissement de son réputation indélicate.

Rappelez-vous bien pour vos lecteurs et lectrices que les fuites
d'un labo sont formellement interdite par les textes du Code de
l'AMA (Agence mondiale de l'anti-dopage). Là, le LNDD n'est
jamais réçu quoi qu'il en soit, en forme d'avertissement par l'AMA.

Le dégâts de votre passion aveuglée d'être un perroquet qui cri
'scandale' en suivant le tactique de votre consœur l'Equipe me
laisse très froid. Si Floyd est coupable ou pas, ce n'est pas par
les analyses des techniciens et techniciennes mal formé(e)s de
ce labo malreputé qu'on en saura.

Le deuxième, c'est que personnellement, j'avais vécu en ce beau
village de Vail, dans les montagnes Rocheuses du Colorado, où en
1987 j'était très fier d'être engagée dans l'hôtel qu'a accueilli
pendant deux nuits l'équipe 'Celestial Seasonings', avec Greg
Lemond, Bernard Hinault, Andy Hampsten (qui tient toujours
le record pour ce course!) 'Jeff' Bernard et Steve Bauer, parmi
d'autres.

C'était sur ma recommandation personnel, qu'ils ont tous diné dans le
restaurant de notre hôtel, qu'ils ont choisissaient ma plat préféré, et ils
ont bien monté le même parcours (petit différence du départ), avec des
résultats extraordinaires.

Donc je voudrais bien que vous me comptez parmi 'ces fans que Floyd
mérite'. Il les a retenu car le preuve n'y sont pas, grâce au labo nationale
de la foutaise.

Ce lettre peut être trouvé prochainement sur mon blog.

Merci d'avoir lu,

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç

LNDD DEAD: END of an ERA???

ZENistas, Landistas, welcome...

As one of your European correspondents, semi-competent in the 'Language of Molière' (French), I have found what may be a MONUMENTAL decision for the French Government, and its management of sports-doping control/testing.

A ZENmud WORLD Exclusive Report

The LNDD may be (is?) DEAD.

Memory lane: in July and August of 2006, the French Laboratoire national du dépistage du dopage (LNDD: roughly the "National Laboratory for the detection of doping"), had found in the course of its testing of Tour de France samples, a 'positive' result for one of Floyd Landis' eight tests; that test happened to follow the most amazing comeback (and how I hate use of the superlative, but: I was there...) in the Tour's recent history. (PHOTO: Professeur De Ceaurriz and M. Lamour, Ministre de la Jeunesse et Sports, colleague unknown)

Structurally, the French laboratory was 'somehow' related to the Agence Française de lutte contre le dopage (AFLD).

I write 'somehow' because it has always been difficult to navigate the French ideas of governmental websites!

But your Humble Correspondent has uncovered a change, if I am correct, that abolishes the LNDD as it is named. The facts as I see them, are:
There is no current up-to-date LNDD website.

This link goes to a site - www.santesport.gouv.fr/ that has not apparently been updated since 2002 (or 2003).

If you see the URL, it carries the name -lndd- at the end of the string. If you search -LNDD- on the newer AFLD website ( www.afld.fr : search box in far upper right corner), you receive FIVE results: click on the second one "Missions de l'AFLD"... Read the second paragraph, headed by: Analyses

I hope you will trust my French translation skills, if yours are not as experienced. In French, the pertinent sentence reads:

"Le LNDD devenant un service de l’Agence en prenant le nom de Département des analyses, l’AFLD dispose de l’unique laboratoire accrédité en France auprès de l’Agence mondiale antidopage."

Can you believe?
Your eyes are clear, my friend(s)...

"The LNDD becoming a service of the Agency (ed: AFLD) in taking the name of 'Department of analyses', the AFLD offers the unique accredited laboratory in France in liaison with the World Anti-doping Agency (WADA)."

And if you search on the AFLD site, the 'Department of analyses', you will link to this page, which discusses how it follows ISO standards (ISO 17025) and is accredited by COFRAC (see ZENmud article discussing COFRAC here)

LNDD is DEAD.
LNDD has FAILED.
LNDD was RESTRUCTURED.

Or it seems so...

Because, friends, when you go to this page, at the AFLD website, you'll see the address for the:
Département des analyses
143, avenue Roger salengro
92290 Châtenay-Malabry (FR)

Floyd may not be pure, may not be innocent, and the sad thing is that WE do not, and never will know.

I've written about the perceived incompetence of LNDD in more than a dozen preceding blog-posts, some of which you could read through these links:

17 May 2007
FLOYDING FRENZY - Day 3 FLASH

Offering the FLASH that the ITF (Tennis Federation) had pulled its testing needs from the French Laboratory at Châtenay-Malabry...

02 May 2007
Que faire avec LNDD? // WADA do about LNDD???

Which, in French, discussed the situation concerning the lack of 'free press' coverage of the seemingly endless litany of errors at the LNDD...

or

24 April 2007
WADA do about L'EQUIPE?? BOYCOTT!!!

This article has a long list of prior links concerning Floyd, WADA and sports-doping problems; it also addresses the fact that the Equipe French sporting newspaper is owned by the Amaury Sport Group, owners of the Tour de France race-event-management firm...

Thank you for reading... I don't think we have yet seen this covered anywhere, but I hate to repeat that this may be...


A WORLD exclusive ZENmud report.

COURAGE ... to ethical Sports fans around the world!

ç*””*”*”*ç*””* ZENmud *””*ç*”*”*””*ç