Well stated Steven! Jed makes people think by making informed
arguments, some of which I also do not share. Apparently his style is
painful to some people, I'm sorry to discover.
Ed
On Jun 14, 2009, at 11:40 AM, OrionWorks wrote:
Hi Kyle,
Regarding my previous response:
Kyle sez:
From: Mark Iverson
Hey Jed, time to go take a vacation
and get some R&R... Go climb a mountain with your
kids. By the time you get back, Bill will have
ended the ban...you won't even know it was in effect!
Better yet, he can contemplate the error of telling
people how they should live their lives, and come down
off his high horse. Hopefully none of this will happen
again, since Bill has thankfully banned religious/
political topics.
Really? That's your impression of Jed?
I would suggest you might want to consider looking in the
mirror when you say that.
I wish to express a public apology to Kyle MCallister. My previous
comment was impulsive, and it shows so. Let me rephrase my prior
thoughts into something less impulsive, and hopefully more thoughtful.
Kyle, I disagree with your assessment of Mr. Rothwell's agenda of
"...telling people how they should live their lives". While I can
sympathize with those whom might feel that that might be Jed's agenda,
I don't think that applies in this specific situation, the situation
that earned Jed his temporary time-out.
It's my understanding that Jed, as the result of making several
prudent career choices in his life, is now in the rare position of
having achieved a level of financial independents most of us can only
dream of. Jed now has the luxury of being able to spend a great deal
of his personal resources on causes he believes in passionately like
supporting alternative energy, especially Cold Fusion. IOW, Jed has
the luxury of being able to assume the role of a reactionary. It is
often the job of reactionaries to ruffle a few feathers every now and
then.
Unfortunately, it is easy to perceive "reactionaries" as having become
a tad too removed from the realities and practicalities of life. It
can occasionally become problematical to take what "reactionaries"
have to say seriously. It's easy to perceive reactionaries as having
climbed on top of a high horse as well. Reactionaries can also be
perceived as eccentric, arrogant, possessing a holier-than-thou
attitude, and perhaps even a little naïve since many will assume such
individuals no longer have to suffer the slings and arrows of being
forced to work forty to sixty hours a week to pay the rent and put
food on the table.
I think what ticked me off, and what caused me to post such an
impulsive response to your statement was that in my view Jed was
unfairly banned for quoting a statement that was actually made by a
Washington Post reviewer. The WP reviewer expressed a personal
opinion/view of what could happen to the Middle East if Cold Fusion
were to become a practical economical reality. Jed went on to state
his OWN counter-views on the subject (which he cc'd to vortex-l) as
follows:
I must say, I disagree with the sentiments expressed. I can
think of lots of more compelling arguments for alternative energy,
such as the fact that it would save tens of thousands of lives
every week and prevent global warming. Marginalizing some anti-
western groups in Arab countries would also be a benefit, but
small in comparison.
In any case, I hope the Middle Eastern oil-producing nations
are not marginalized, or turned into a cultural backwater. That
does seem likely, but I hope instead that they benefit as much
from cold fusion as much as anyone else, and also from a
renaissance in science. Naturally, I hope the end of petro-dollars
will reducing funding for terrorism! But I do not blame Middle
Eastern nations because they happen to be sitting on a lot of oil
and we have made them extremely wealthy. I think that was a
misguided thing to do but it was our fault, not theirs.
Apparently, Jed got banned because, technically speaking, he broke Mr.
Beaty's temporary ban of posting political (and religious) statements.
I don't dispute that fact. I also realize that technically speaking I
am deliberately disobeying Mr. Beaty's temporary ban by deliberately
posting additional political commentary on Vortex-l as well. Mr. Beaty
is perfectly in his right to ban me. I have done so because I felt it
was more important, in this particular case, to help clear up what I
thought might exist certain misconceptions. I also don't think it was
fair to Jed, and have more than once offered myself as a "prisoner
exchange" if it would help get Jed reinstated back into Vortex-l more
quickly. Call it an act of civil disobedience. ;-)
Therefore, before I am personally banned as well, I ask you: Kyle:
Where in these statements that apparently earned Jed a temporary
time-out did you come to the conclusion that Mr. Rothwell is telling
other people how to live their lives? Where in these statements that
Jed made did you come to the conclusion that Mr. Rothwell needs to
come off his high horse?
Regards
Steven Vincent Johnson
www.OrionWorks.com
www.zazzle.com/orionworks
