'We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny….the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous.'James Hanson, 2012 http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/05/10-2
Published on Thursday, May 10, 2012 by The New York Times
Dr. James Hansen is director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and adjunct professor in the department of earth and environmental sciences at Columbia University. He was the first scientist to warn the US Congress of the dangers of climate change and writes here as a private citizen. Hansen is the author of "Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity."
When the numbers of military suicides is greater than the number of military combat casualties, which is the situation in the US military at present, it does not require vast brain power to notice something is very wrong. That small amount of intelligence appears beyond the capacity of the evil ones. Unless that’s what they intended in the first place, of course.
Two of Europe’s most celebrated painters, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, were good friends and loyal comrades, who spent much time in each other’s company, hanging out together.
Both filled with the lust for life, they patronized the same bordello [brothel, house of ill repute, wisma, knocking shop, the names vary for a house where ladies of easy virtue, or the world’s oldest profession] ply their trade.
A problem arose when both men formed an attachment for the same lady. Emotions rose high, and reached the point where knives were drawn for some serious violence, and van Gogh had his ear sliced off by his friend Gauguin.
The nineteenth century police of Paris were even less inclined than their modern counterparts to go easy on disreputable artists ‘causing an affray’ in a house of ill repute, the wound could not be hidden, and immediate effective action was demanded to avoid the most unpleasant consequences, certainly long terms of imprisonment, perhaps worse.
Gauguin slid quietly away and booked passage on the closest available vessel, which happened to be going to the South Seas, and Vincent van Gogh created one of the most enduring of all artistic fairy tales, still taught in schools around the world, that he sliced off his own ear as a present to a lady who admired what was one of the few good points in a fairly ruffianly appearance.
Artistic creations often have a force and conviction far surpassing that of real life, of logic, of probability, of simple common sense, and so it proved of van Gogh’s artistic fable, conceived simply to evade the local constabulary. Even as intelligent a commentator as Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh of the Orange People spent one of his talks on pointing out that a severed ear loses the beauty it had while attached to the head. Yes indeed.
Van Gogh went on to produce what are now some of the world’s most expensive paintings and Gauguin became famous for his paintings of brown skinned ladies in the South Seas.
The legend of the severed ear did no harm to either.
'The moving finger writes, and having writ Moves on. Not all thy piety nor wit Can call it back to cancel half a line Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.'
4 comments:
'We should impose a gradually rising carbon fee, collected from fossil fuel companies, then distribute 100 percent of the collections to all Americans on a per-capita basis every month. The government would not get a penny….the reduction in oil use resulting from the carbon price would be nearly six times as great as the oil supply from the proposed pipeline from Canada, rendering the pipeline superfluous.'James Hanson, 2012
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/05/10-2
Published on Thursday, May 10, 2012 by The New York Times
Dr. James Hansen is director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and adjunct professor in the department of earth and environmental sciences at Columbia University. He was the first scientist to warn the US Congress of the dangers of climate change and writes here as a private citizen. Hansen is the author of "Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity."
When the numbers of military suicides is greater than the number of military combat casualties, which is the situation in the US military at present, it does not require vast brain power to notice something is very wrong. That small amount of intelligence appears beyond the capacity of the evil ones. Unless that’s what they intended in the first place, of course.
Two of Europe’s most celebrated painters, Vincent van Gogh and Paul Gauguin, were good friends and loyal comrades, who spent much time in each other’s company, hanging out together.
Both filled with the lust for life, they patronized the same bordello [brothel, house of ill repute, wisma, knocking shop, the names vary for a house where ladies of easy virtue, or the world’s oldest profession] ply their trade.
A problem arose when both men formed an attachment for the same lady. Emotions rose high, and reached the point where knives were drawn for some serious violence, and van Gogh had his ear sliced off by his friend Gauguin.
The nineteenth century police of Paris were even less inclined than their modern counterparts to go easy on disreputable artists ‘causing an affray’ in a house of ill repute, the wound could not be hidden, and immediate effective action was demanded to avoid the most unpleasant consequences, certainly long terms of imprisonment, perhaps worse.
Gauguin slid quietly away and booked passage on the closest available vessel, which happened to be going to the South Seas, and Vincent van Gogh created one of the most enduring of all artistic fairy tales, still taught in schools around the world, that he sliced off his own ear as a present to a lady who admired what was one of the few good points in a fairly ruffianly appearance.
Artistic creations often have a force and conviction far surpassing that of real life, of logic, of probability, of simple common sense, and so it proved of van Gogh’s artistic fable, conceived simply to evade the local constabulary. Even as intelligent a commentator as Bhagwan Sri Rajneesh of the Orange People spent one of his talks on pointing out that a severed ear loses the beauty it had while attached to the head. Yes indeed.
Van Gogh went on to produce what are now some of the world’s most expensive paintings and Gauguin became famous for his paintings of brown skinned ladies in the South Seas.
The legend of the severed ear did no harm to either.
'The moving finger writes, and having writ
Moves on. Not all thy piety nor wit
Can call it back to cancel half a line
Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.'
Omar Khayyam, Rubayat
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