Vince Taylor and his Playboys - Brand New Cadillac

This is my introduction to the original. Great job, great song, great players. British lads at that! 1959. 

Vince Taylor seems like a guy worth reading more about. Nervous breakdowns are always interesting. 

Doom On The Quantum Side

 

Say thanks, everybody! Last night I spontaneously grabbed a notebook and started writing. It began:

“It's all too much! Personally, medically, politically, meteorologically. How are we supposed to plan?”

It all went downhill quickly after that, for about four pages. Today, my plan is to spare you that solar-flare of complaining. Instead, here's a warning about the world of the future! There remain details that need to be worked out; there is a lot of math that needs to be completed. 2030? Longer, probably. 2040? Could be. 2050? You can bet on it.

First, the problem, then, the causes.

We live in a surveillance state, and there are countries in the world where it is already much worse than America. Imagine, for a moment, what this will turn into within twenty or thirty years. This will happen almost on its own motion, by its own inertia. The surveillance state of the future will be your constant companion, creating on the fly a complete record of every aspect of your life.

It is too creepy to consider what will be watching and listening to us in our own homes, so I will leave those speculations to you.

Going out is a different story. There will be cameras at every doorway, on every street, at every intersection, watching public transportation from every angle, and there will be hundreds of cameras observing every public space. Images of you will move seamlessly from one camera to another. You will be tracked every minute, everywhere, by facial recognition software. License plate readers will track every movement of your car. A license plate that does not match the make and model of the car will draw immediate police response. Where you go, what you buy, whom you talk to, all of it will be carefully observed, and preserved, in HD. It gets worse.

In the future, every conversation will be recorded. Not only telephone conversations, but every conversation of any kind or duration. If you talk to yourself, it will be recorded. All of this will be saved forever, perfectly collated both personally and chronologically. Careful attention will be paid to all interpersonal information. Whom do you know? Where do you meet? What do you discuss? Lists will be created, and relationships will be clarified. All of this information will be available to any law enforcement agency, however specialized, small, and obscure, at any time, and without probable cause or warrant.

All of this will be sold to the population as a great advance in public safety! What, do you have something to hide? Planning a crime, maybe? Are you a terrorist? If not, you have nothing to worry about. If you complain, you must indeed have something to hide. You will have made yourself a person of interest to the authorities. All of this will be done purely to protect the citizenry. They will say, “you can trust us!”

The full flowering of this program will be enabled by true familiarity with fully functional quantum computer networks.

QUANTUM COMPUTERS

Our ubiquitous current computers work pretty well, but they can only go so far. Sure, they are still getting faster, and the new generations of super-computers are impressive, but they are severely limited by their reliance on switches that have only two positions. This is represented by a “1,” or a “0” in the writing of code used for software. Software is the set of instructions that tells the computer what to do when some flash of whatever it is hits that switch.

Software has traditionally lagged way behind hardware. It still does. Operating systems are large structures made of software that enable a piece of hardware to function at all. Some operating systems are hopeless (stage cough, Microsoft!). Some are marginally better. None are trouble free, secure, and easy to install and use. We already have artificial intelligence (AI) to an extent, and it is getting better at learning new things and moving beyond its human programming. But even the super-computers are still pretty slow, and our home computers are kind of sad.

Quantum computers will brush aside all of these weaknesses in a nonce. They will probably begin almost at once to communicate with each other and write their own software. It's hard for normal people like me to imagine what they will be able to accomplish. If they were being honest, I think it is also hard for computer professionals to imagine what that new landscape will look like.

What the hell is quantum computing anyway? (The writer takes a deep breath.) Let me try to address it in the simplest way possible, which is coincidentally the only understanding of it that I possess.

We, I say we, I mean physicists, people like that, the Big Bang Theory crowd, have been digging deeper and deeper into the reality that makes up matter. One of the Greek philosophers came up with the idea that there must be an incredibly small thing that comes in different flavors and that combinations of these tiny things should be called atoms. Over the centuries, our scientists have become more familiar with these tiny things, and by now they are discovering ever smaller generations of tiny thing. They are beginning to wonder if this process will ever end. How small do things get? That's the question, unanswered as we speak.

These super-tiny things do not behave like the larger fragments of reality. They exhibit “quantum mechanics.” I have no understanding of this subject, in spite of having read numerous articles and even one smallish book about it. The importance of things quantum to computer development has mostly to do with superposition and entanglement. They often change, in ways that scientists are now desperately trying to understand, and they seem to come in pairs, which can be separated by considerable distance. Wherever they are, they can affect the behavior of their mate.

If current computers have two dimensions, open or shut, quantum computers will have something like a dozen dimensions. That's a guess. It might be eighteen, for all I know. This will allow quantum computers to operate at speeds that will require a completely new vocabulary to describe. Qubits! Millikelvins! It has already started.

The geniuses say, hey! Don't worry! Quantum computers won't be able to do anything that one of our modern computers can't do! Small consolation, I'm afraid. After all, you could say the same thing about a super-computer just being a slightly more efficient version of your laptop.

In truth, we will be facing limitless powers of data collection and analysis, limitless powers of collation, limitless powers of memory and retrieval. All at the speed of light (figuratively). Will your quantum computer's encryption tools protect you from your enemy's quantum computers?

2050! Thirty years away. What's to become of us in the meantime? Is anyone expecting democracy to make a comeback? Anything can happen, I suppose, but anything includes many alternative fates. In the last thirty years, we've seen our American government, under both Democratic and Republican administrations, criminalize almost everything, put wildly increasing numbers of Americans in prison (mostly black Americans, for mostly non-violent crimes, and for numbers of years that are hard to fathom), weaken Constitutional rights and traditional Common Law protections, and increase the number and power of Federal police forces. We've also seen American culture reduced to fake-tits and celebrities who are famous just for being famous. American education has been degraded to the point of uselessness. Unless, that is, one is blessed with rich parents who can afford a real education. (And even the products of those elite institutions don't seem to have learned much while they were there.)

Is there any reason to think that this slide into legal and intellectual oblivion will somehow reverse itself?

Quantum computing faces additional challenges before it can become self-aware and take over, or at least allow our autocratic leaders to take further control of our lives. These challenges include, but are not limited to:

Weird materials, like Helium-3, which so far only exists as a byproduct of nuclear research. Cheaper replacements will be found. Probably on the moon.

Many of the final components will require superconducting abilities that are hard to come by now. Thirty years to solve that one? Piece of cake.

Quantum computers must be isolated from the surrounding real world, lest “entanglement” interactions ruin the whole effect. Easy.

Scientists must learn to avoid “quantum decoherence.”

I leave you to go and figure out that last one for yourself. I love to be helpful, but there's only so much a man can do.

The suicide Machines - What I Like About You

It must be mildly distressing when a band gets ahold of a good song and puts out a decent version, but then another band covers it and CUTS THE ORIGINAL TO RIBBONS. 

I wouldn't like that at all. 

Big Youth - Hit The Road Jack -

Featuring the Big Youth Band! 

Today I was walking home from school, singing to myself, as is my habit when no one is around. I find that in these plague times, since we all have masks on, you can sing to yourself all you want. You can sing to yourself in a crowd. Ain't nobody sure it's you with everybody masked up. It's fun! Try it! 

I was singing the original demo of this song, as performed, drunk probably, by the writer, the great Percy Mayfield, the "Poet of the Blues." Ray Charles paid Percy for it, and made a great hit out of it. Played it Ray Charles Style. 

Here's the Youth himself having a crack at it! Playing it Big Youth Style. 

"What the world needs now is love, sweet love." I think that fella's right. 

Writing About The Hell That Is World Politics

Politics today looks to me like a jungle where all of the trees are full of monkeys throwing scat at the passers by. I usually try to avoid the mess. I do try to touch-base everyday with some reliable sources of current events news, but it is all so otherworldly and disturbing that I wonder if there is any benefit from the effort.

And writing about it? There seem to be enough people already beating their heads against that brick wall. I can offer them my sincerest gratitude and admiration, because it would be terrible if no one wrote about it. I am not tough enough to engage with that task seriously. Reading up on current events is difficult enough.

I like to watch trailers for new movies. The volume of product that now appears monthly inevitably includes some real clunkers. I watch the trailer, and my reaction is often, “who gave this bullshit the green light?” My reaction to most of the news is very similar, “whose fucking stupid idea was that?”

I'm going to get this off my chest right here and now: this is what happens when you put the stupid people in charge. I know that I regularly beat this dead horse, but since people keep voting for fools I suppose it's worth repeating. Forty years of stupid in America, plus stupid off and on in most of Europe, and really fucking stupid permanently in most of the world, whether they are dressed in nice suits or ridiculous military uniforms, stupid people have been driving the bus for a long time. And now, while they are checking their bank transfers on their phones, they are piloting the bus right off the damn cliff. That strange silence that has come over our existence only means that we have become airborne. Don't look out the window, people, just close your eyes and make your peace with God. It's Thelma and Louise time.

The political news is not without its comedic value. Rudi G., the Kraken squad, that idiot Louis Gohmert (whose name includes the term, “Gomer”), other senators from states that shouldn't even have senators, they're all filling up the Federal Courts with weird, frivolous lawsuits. I'm a lawyer myself, and I admit I love to watch them twisting in the wind when those lawsuits are dismissed, and the judge starts yelling at them and awarding lawyers' fees to the other side. Defending a case in Federal Court is expensive, even if your team manages to get it kicked out early.

I am thrilled when these miscreants are separated from their law licenses, even when it is only a suspension. Regular people have no idea of the huge amount of work that comes with a suspension. You cannot practice law; you must notify all of your clients in writing; you must return to them any money of theirs that you are holding in your trust account. In California, and probably most jurisdictions, you must also take a course in legal ethics, and re-take the “Professional Responsibility” portion of the bar exam. Failure to comply gets you disbarred. It's a nightmare! What fun to watch!

Didn't I read this week that the legislature of the great State of Tennessee has gone 100% anti-vaccination? Now illegal to mandate vaccinations of any kind in the legislature? Something like that. People should be free to make their own decisions. Who, you may ask, comes up with these cockamamie ideas? Actually, stupid people come up with them, that's who. Stupid legislators, writing stupid laws, to impress their stupid voters. Reactionaries who long for the Good Old Days when children died of diphtheria and whooping cough. Stupid, probably religious people, who think that God blessed us with Rubella, measles, and the mumps for a reason! Who are we to stand in the way of God's viruses and bacteria? Thank God that we saved some small pox in a lab somewhere.

Always in the name of FREEDOM!

It's not surprising that so many people prefer to get their news from Q.

How's The Weather By You?

I have family in the Rhineland-Palatinate in Germany. In truth, they are my ex-wife's family. Her mom was raised there, long story. I love this family. They were always good to me. I'm a “sprecher,” as the Hassidim say. Ich kann ein wenig Deutsch sprechen. They visited our first apartment in New York when we were newlyweds. They always made a fuss about our hospitality, and how much they enjoyed the big meal that we prepared (veal parmigiana), and they returned the favor when we visited them in Germany. I even visited once on my own, and I was treated like one of the family. I was reading today about areas very close to them that were devastated by floods CAUSED BY RAIN. I want to emphasize the fact that floods in these Rhine River adjacent towns are traditionally caused by the river flooding and breaking it's levies. Water from up stream, water from Switzerland. I read in a German source that in one town in the valley of the Ruhr River it rained, hard, for fifty-four hours straight.

By the way, similar rain has also been falling in Switzerland, causing flooding there. The big lakes there are overflowing. This water will soon be rushing down the length of the Rhine, causing additional flooding in Germany and the Netherlands. This rain ain't natural.

Nor are the fires already smoking California like a Country Ham. Remember when the “fire season” was September and October? Sure, all Californians remember that. Our new “fire season” starts in June, and the flames cover the entire West Coast, including British Columbia. These fires ain't natural.

Nor is it natural for the Siberian permafrost to turn into mud right up around your boots, like some Penn and Teller gag. Didn't I read that about two million acres have burned in Siberia this year? So far, it's still July. Putin seems to like all of this, because there will be a lot of money to be made from the new “Northern Passage,” the new “Polar Sea Route” to the Pacific AND the Atlantic. Maybe easier to drill for oil too! Hey, can we make some money on all of this new methane that is being released?

And did you notice that ocean-side ten story condo building that collapsed in Miami the other day, killing over a hundred people? Sea level rising much? They are already starting to see danger signs in the underpinnings of the lake-side sky-scrapers in Chicago. Cliff-side was the hot set up along the California coast for decades. Mansions; more affordable developments. All starting to collapse now.

It's July, and we've already had our fifth named Atlantic hurricane.

Are there any politicians offering sensible responses to this weather hell that has descended on us? Maybe the occasional expression of concern when someone pushes a microphone in their faces. That's from Democrats anyway. Republicans still say that it's all a hoax. Look at that snow! So much for Global Warming! They all get their scripts from the money guys, along with their money to offshore accounts.

As far as deeds go, what we are seeing is too little, and much too late. No one in either politics or business is taking this climate catastrophe seriously. I do see some young people getting suitably worked up about it, but they are individuals who have no power, people whose warnings and complaints will be wasted on the air and the trees. (As the great man said, “bitch at the air, bitch at the trees, just don't bitch at me.” Big extra points to the reader who can identify that movie reference!) No, the stupidos in charge are frozen in their corruption bubbles.

The name of the game is short-term profits for corporations. The future will sort itself out. Who knows what will happen? We answer to our shareholders.

Drum Roll, Please!

Any fans of Democrats still out there? Any die-hard fans of the great Democratic Party? Anybody still expecting them to come up with the guts to win while they're holding all of the cards? The presidency, the Senate (barely), and the House? Dream on, dreamers.

Hey, Democrats! Here's a free martial arts lesson for you:

1. When you put your opponent back on his heels, don't allow him to regain his balance. Swarm him and knock his ass down;

2. When you put your opponent on the ground, don't just stand back and catch your breath. Don't let him get up. Start kicking him as hard and as fast as you can. If he covers his head, kick his testicles, kick his floating ribs and kidneys; if he covers his lower areas, kick him as hard as you can in the head. The back of the head is best. Do it again. Don't stop until he is unconscious;

3. If he has really managed to piss you off, drag his ass over to the curb, lay his arm straight out into the street, elbow up, and then stomp the elbow as hard as you can. If this does not result in a satisfying “snap!”, do it again.

Brother, that's the way you win a fight.

The filibuster! Kneel on that thing's chest and choke the life out of it. Gouge its eyes out. WIN! Simple majority! You win! Now get busy, because you are the only ones who can save American democracy, and maybe even something corporate-approved to mitigate this climate mess.

Is it going to happen? No. The STUPID is going to win again.

Okay, I feel better. Thanks for reading. Do what you can, or don't. See if I care. I ain't in charge.

Bon Ton Roula, by Clarence Garlow

Clarence recorded this song in 1950, 1951, and 1953. My guess is that this is the first one, 1950, because the rhumba beat is so up-front. This record made the top ten on the Billboard R&B chart. 

Sound The Bell, by Clarence Garlow

This one is from 1957. Clarence was a damn fine guitar player by then.