Picture of the Week.

Seropedica Recovery Center Rio De Janeiro.
Baby parrots waiting to be released back into the wild.

Time.com

Blue States Political Solution.

This is the first time i just copy and paste something i received by e-mail a couple of days ago from one of my smartest friends, Kanna, the same person that gifted me with the funny song i posted last Thursday. I do this for two reasons, the first is that i think the letter you're gonna read in a few seconds is one of the funniest things I've never read in my life. The second reason is that, even if i cannot complain for the results this blog is achieving in less than a year, i confess that during the week-end my stats say that nobody gives a f..k about it. That's why i never post on week ends, but this time I'm gonna change, it's a sort of fidelity bonus to all the few people who will download this page during the starting week end. Remember I'm Italian, so for this first time a "copy&paste" i think will be more than enough, please forgive me if you don't agree.

Blue States Political Solution.

Dear Red States:
We've decided we're leaving. We intend to form our own country and
we're taking the other Blue States with us. In case you aren't aware,
that includes California, Hawaii, Oregon, Washington, Minnesota,
Wisconsin, Michigan, Illinois and all of the Northeast. We believe
this split will be beneficial to the nation, and especially to the
people of the new country of New California.

To sum up briefly: You get Texas, Oklahoma and all the slave states.
We get stem cell research, the best beaches and the Statue of
Liberty. You get Dollywood. We get Intel and Microsoft. You get
WorldCom. We get Harvard. You get Ole' Miss. We get 85 percent of
America's venture capital and entrepreneurs.
You get Alabama and we get two-thirds of the tax revenue;
you get to make the red states pay their fair share.

Since our aggregate divorce rate is 22 percent lower than the
Christian Coalition's, we get a bunch of happy families. You get a
bunch of single moms. Please be aware that Nuevo California will be
pro gay-rights, pro-choice and anti-war, and we're going to want all
our citizens back from Iraq at once. If you need people to fight, ask
your evangelicals. They have kids they're apparently willing to send
to their deaths for no purpose, and they don't care if you don't show
pictures of their children's caskets coming home.

We do wish you success in Iraq, and hope that the WMDs turn up, but
we're not willing to spend our resources in Bush's Quagmire.

With the Blue States in hand, we will have firm control of 80 percent
of the country's fresh water, more than 90 percent of the pineapple
and lettuce, 92 percent of the nation's fresh fruit, 95 percent of
America's quality wines, 90 percent of all cheese, 90 percent of the
high tech industry, most of the U.S. low-sulfur coal, all living
redwoods, sequoias and condors, all the Ivy and Seven Sister schools
plus Stanford, Cal Tech and MIT.

With the Red States, on the other hand, you will have to cope with 88
percent of all obese Americans (and their projected health care
costs), 92 percent of all U.S. mosquitoes, nearly 100 percent of the
tornadoes, 90 percent of the hurricanes, 99 percent of all Southern
Baptists, virtually 100 percent of all televangelists, Rush Limbaugh,
Bob Jones University, Clemson and the University of Georgia. We get
Hollywood and Yosemite, thank you.

Additionally, 38 percent of those in the Red states believe Jonah was
actually swallowed by a whale, 62 percent believe life is sacred
unless we're discussing the war, the death penalty or gun laws, 44
percent say that evolution is only a theory, 53 percent that Saddam
was involved in 9/11 and 61 percent of you crazy bastards believe
you are the people with higher morals then we lefties.

Finally, we're taking the good pot, too. You can have that dirt weed
they grow in Mexico.

Thank you for your time and attention.

- Thank you Kanna -

Dry Tortugas.

As everyday, i was riding my express downtown's train when, surprisingly, the magazine in my hands showed me the picture you see on the left and i thought right away: what the hell is that?
That's Dry Tortugas National Park, Florida, one of the many car-free sites in United States.
Of course this blog supports any sort of pro-environment initiative and National Parks are one of the smartest demonstration that human beings and nature can perfectly share the same environment. Planning vacations in protected areas is honorable and prove that men can be intelligent at the point to understand that vacation doesn't always mean luxury or long siestas. In fact in most of these kind of Parks there's nothing than a beautiful nature to admire and camping there is a really primitive experience, you'd better bring with you the water you need to drink and to wash yourself. That's very cool and useful. I'd love to have the time and energy to face a trip in one of these beautiful American car-free islands like Channel Islands National Park, a beautiful archipelago virtually free of people despite being only 60 miles far away from Los Angeles. The archipelago counts 5 islands, home of thousands of species of plants and animals 145 of which are found nowhere else on earth. If you are so lucky to live close to Maine, it won't be so difficult for you to reach Isle au Haut, a pine-slab of rock 7 miles off the coast of the Arcadia National Park. But the choice you have is huge: Cumberland Island National Seashore -Georgia-, Isle Royale National Park -Michigan-, Fire Island -New York-, Cape Lookout national Seashore -North Carolina- and many others...
So, go there, you'll enjoy nature and you'll experience something new.
I spent almost 5 minutes observing the beautiful image of Dry Tortugas and many thoughts came to me. The first though, i confess, was an embarrassing mistake, in fact i couldn't understand how they could be able to name a resort big like that as a National Park. They'd been able just because that's not a resort and there's no jacuzzi rooms inside it.
That's the nineteenth-century Fort Jefferson and the island was discovered in 1513 by Ponce De Leon who used plenty of tortugas (turtles) as a provision of fresh meat for his ships, but he had no fresh water so, Dry Tortugas.
Looking so long at the picture and having under my eyes just that big title "Car-Free Islands", i felt like living the depressing future that many movies already showed me... that kind of situations where there's only couple of hundreds protected areas on the planet where you can find no cars or generally no human negative impacts. Reserves. That's why i thought that i want a future where the concept of Protected Area or National Park won't exist anymore. I don't want any national park in my future.
I mean, the change i hope for the next years suggests me that cars will be able to go anywhere they want or anywhere there's a street (no Dry Tortugas...), because cars won't pollute anymore. I don't intend my future as a polluted world with a nice and every time less extended, not polluted protected area or national park. The same idea of national park let me feel like i need it. In a clean world there's no national parks guys, the whole planet is a f....ing national park. At least we could accept some restricted areas where to put the factories we could not survive without and that's it.
The concept and the idea of no-impact vacation is great, but I'd like this to be the rule. As you already know I'd like many things to change in our up coming future, in the mean time enjoy your time in the American National Parks never forgetting that you can always hope to find that beautiful nature closer to the place where you live, that means every where.
Thank you for your time and attention.

- Plenty Magazine - Fortjefferson.com - Yankeefreedom.com -
- Sunnydayskeywest.com -

Mon Song.

Have a good week.

Pixies - Where Is My Mind.

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
But there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin'

I was swimmin' in the Caribbean
Animals were hiding behind the rocks
Except the little fish
But they told me he swears
Tryin' to talk to me, coy koi

Where is my mind

Way out in the water
See it swimmin'

With your feet in the air and your head on the ground
Try this trick and spin it, yeah
Your head will collapse
But there's nothing in it
And you'll ask yourself

Where is my mind...

Picture of the Week.

Chinese workers taking rest in a cotton field in Manas - Xinjiang region.

China Daily - Reuters

Hipsters.

It looks like you cannot read anymore a nice magazine without facing with this curious and -for me- absolutely unknown word. Hipster, hipsters, hipsterdom, hipster era...
Finally for the first time i write about something i can see everyday with my eyes, simply because i live in the city of hipsters. New York. Williamsburg and Bushwick -two of the most popular and fancy Brooklyn's neighborhoods- are crowded of them, but you can easily see lots of hipsters even in the East-Village, Harlem or Astoria -Queens-, it just depends on their parent's money. Yes, actually this is one of the most common critics you can read anywhere you read about hipsters, these guys are not supposed to be part of the working class but they pretend to dress that way. In their fancy lecture of thrift-shop t-shirts or really cheap warm and inappropriate wool coats, hipsters don't spend a lot of money to appear, sometimes they wear expensive clothes but always appearing cheap and not that just showered.
What is a hipster? The problem is that a definition of this counterculture's movement actually doesn't exist. Most of the people that hardly criticize these guys talk about their meaninglessness abusing of glorious icons that used to signify very much for many people all around the world in the past. The idea of hipster is generally indefinable. We can say this people wear skinny jeans, cotton spandex leggings, vintage flannel, fake eyeglasses, keffiyeh, American Apparel V-neck shirts. As you already know they buy in thrift-shops but it seems also they eat organic, locally grown, vegetarian or vegan food, they ride bicycles, they mostly smoke Parliament and they never forget home their camera. Generally we can say hipsters are middle-upper class adults (18-34, I'm out) with interest in non-mainstream fashion and culture.
That's why if you go to a hipsters' party and you ask someone: "Is this a hipster party?", he or she is gonna reply: "Don't you see? 99% of the people around you is a hipster". But when you'll ask: "Are you a hipster?", he or she will reply for sure: "Fuck no". You won't find anyone who will define him or herself as a hipster.
Actually i deal with hipsters -or with people dressed like that- everyday, i share this city with them, i use the same trains or buses, i work with them -clients or colleagues- i spend time in the same bars...
What i personally can say is that they're very young, and they dress the way they want. Most of them are students or sort of artists moved to New York in a view to demonstrate their family they can do something great in their lives -old story-, usually, they come from middle and not that upper class, so their parent are not supposed to finance them a luxury New York lifestyle. They buy second hand clothes, they leave scarce tips at restaurants and bars and of course, like everyone at that age, they act like adults sometimes getting arrogant. I just think they're angry. I see hipsters like that kind of guys grown up with no problems with money, grown up in the center of the globalization era. Most of them don't know the meaning of a no global world as i do, that's why i buy local like them when i can.
I'm also sure that if you go to one of them asking about wars, corporations, environment issues, philosophy, web, arts you could find yourself surprised. These people simply understood that globalization fucked up the world, they're just trying to change young people's mentality like stop eating in fast foods, stop buying big-chain-products and other important educational like that. Of course they look so similar each others and they dress like following a fucking meaningless trend, but believe, if you life in New York you need to go shopping and when the maximum you can afford is a 4 dollars t-shirt, you buy it, and you love it. Above all if you are a 21 years old so lucky to live in a city like this without your parents. Come on guys, everyone of us should consider him or herself in paradise, or better, like a cool modern hero.
I usually wear a keffyieh, i eat no meat, i used to smoke Parliament -DON'T SMOKE-, so am i a hipster apart I'm drastically out of age? Maybe if i was younger i should be part of them, they look so involved in getting better of our society, and, of course they are different. They think different, they are single persons and singles brain thinking. Why every time something easy, pacific and polite is trying to appear in a society, envy old puritans try to destroy it accusing of meaninglessness. Hipsters just didn't get into globalization that much.
Some of them are fake, i recognize -like the ones who ridiculously wear fake eyeglasses- but most of them gave me the sensation of no-global, anti-violence, silencious protesters. They look to me with an adorable touch of retro', they usually believe in family values and, as i can say no one of these guys or girls had been impolite with me, all that make me smile any time i meet with some of these sons of global world. Maybe they're the good side of gobalized guys. Do you prefer people who spend 15 hours a day in front a play-station or a television?
I wear American Apparel t-shirts. So what? They're cheap -kind of- and the quality is ok, do i need to be afraid that I'm using a no-logo icon of no-logo with meaninglessness? Come on, try to talk with these guys, and maybe you're gonna find some interesting guy or girl, they can have beautiful ideas, they can be intelligent, stupid, educated or not, they're young, in New York and with no parents. They also just know the "Patriot act reality", so they don't even think there was a time you could see someone even pissing on the streets of New York, and not only as you guess. Of course the fact they don't use heroine or crack has to be taken as a very good news, that's why i really don't understand that journalists that criticize hipster suddenly reminding how cool was living New York 10/15 years ago...i read crazy things complaining about the fact that New York's arts scene is poorer and poorer cos nowadays dealers in Washington square just deal with NYU kids or because there's anymore that 20 yo art kids jammed on acid at clubs in the middle of the night. Maybe it's true and i can believe it but two things: is this hipster guys the responsibility of the absence of any new underground creative community? Second, did any critic journalist of these important papers never take an acid?
Thank you for your time and attention.

- ADbusters - Paper - Wikipedia.org -

Mon Song.

Have a good week. Volume suggestion: really loud.

Bloc Party - Banquet

A heart of stone, a smoking gun
I can give you life, i can take it away

A heart of stone, a smoking gun
I'm working it out
Why'd you feel so underrated?
Why'd you feel so negated?

Turning away from the light
Becoming adult
Turning into my soul
I wanted to bite not destroy
To feel her underneath
Turning into my soul

She don't think straight no no no...she don't think straight
She got such a dirty mind and it never ever stops
And you don't taste like her and you never ever will
And we don't read the papers, we don't read the news
Heaven's never enough, we will never be fooled

Turning away from the light
Becoming adult
Turning into my soul
I wanted to bite not destroy
To feel her underneath
Turning into my soul

And if you feel a little left behind
I will see you on the other side

Cos I'm on fire
You know I'm on fire when you come

I'm on fire so stub me out.

Picture of the Week.

Mecca, Saudi Arabia, tens of thousands people congregated for the last week of Ramadam.

bbc.com

Interview With Antonio Di Pietro.

Antonio Di Pietro
Italian Minister for Public Works in 1996
EuroParliament Member in 2004
Italian Minister of Infrastructures in 2006.
President of the Italia dei Valori Party.

PD: Peacedrops
AdP: Antonio Di Pietro

I'd like to invite you to read the articles i posted on Aug. 29 (Alitalia) Sept. 22 (coming next), Oct. 1 (upload) before reading the following interview. If you already did, or you already know the matter we are talking about than just enjoy the honor this great man gave this blog answering its questions.

PD: Again Mr. Di Pietro i really thank you for taking into consideration this young blog, that means you're really close to everyone of us, even if (like me) we live far away from home. I'd like to start asking you something about Alitalia. What's going on, did they sell it? Who's now the owner?
AdP: Thank you for this first question. When he was asked about the matter Mr. President Berlusconi said: "Mission accomplished". I wonder which mission was he talking about and which rescue was he dreaming about? Alitalia as a business company doesn't still exist anymore, bankrupt. In simple words we can say that now it had become a smaller company, victims: workers and tax payers. It looked to me like an extortion, a moral and politic extortion, that kind of things that disappear from newspaper in just a few days, like it effectively had happened in Italy. Now CAI (the Italian entrepreneurs and banks interested in buying the company without its debts of course) is starting and look for foreign buyers. I didn't get why the same State, the Italian Republic itself couldn't do it (like Prodi Government did with AirFrance -that up to now remain the best offer-).
PD: Looks like for you everything is Berlusconi's fault.
AdP: To be honest i really don't hate Mr. Berlusconi as a person. What i very don't like is that kind of politicians that always take position against poor not visible people and work hard to give more and more power to a few elite of lucky men. That's the point, you cannot even imagine how much i care at the future of workers that every month need to invent something new to get the 4th week without letting their kids without a meal, you cannot imagine how much i care at the future of our country, i put all my effort and the energy that God give to me everyday. The whole problem is that the Government don't care as i do.
Italia dei Valori (Italy of Values) party is always on the side of honest citizens and fight for their rights. You want an example? Yesterday (read Oct 7) at the Press Room of the Italian Chamber of Deputes took place a conference to announce the petition to promote Referendum against the "Lodo Alfano" and that will start on October the 11th in Piazza Navona, Rome. We'll all get to the Piazza to abolish an immoral and unconstitutional law. We think we're fighting a hard and with no-concessions war for legality, in a view to re-establish the equality of all Italians in front of the law.
PD: Polls tell us that since the last Italian general elections your Party the Italia dei Valori almost doubled the number of voters, but what exactely is this party, someone called it the "YouTube Party".
AdP: Polls tell us that Italia dei Valori is around an 8%. That's represent a wonderful result, a result that reminds us, every day, the big issues we have to face in respect of all that people that believe in what we do. We need to be constantly next to people to understand their problem and defend their rights. Nobody else does it in our country, we took charge of it. To improve this sort of direct line, direct touch with people we started, day after day, to use the internet as a main instrument. Did you know, for example, that everyone of the Italia dei Valori's member of the Italian Parliament regularly reply to the e-mails from private citizens? Our party is strictly connected with the base of our society. Of course, as the president, i do the same thing they do. I talk with people. I try to be punctual in replying to the plenty e-mails i receive everyday and i do the same with the questions that normal people ask me through the blog antoniodipietro.com. After so long there's a spontaneous direct relationship with citizens, i feel tied to them and this make me feel safe. Me and the Italia dei Valori Party will never get into the dark Italian power rooms.
PD: What kind of Government would you like to serve?
AdP: The Government of my dreams? The one that really get into the citizen's rights and fight for it. A Government that really respect people. A Government able to give back to our country the dignity and the respect it used to deserve, never forgetting the values coming from our incredibly amazing Constitution. Always, no exceptions.
PD: Thank you very very much President Di Pietro, please never give up, and thank you guys for your time and attention.

Many thanks to Mrs. Fabiola Paterniti, Capo-Ufficio Stampa President Di Pietro and Mrs. Sara Mangieri , National Vice-Coordinator of the Italia dei Valori Party.

What's Going On?

Every time i write an article to post on Peacedrops it's because there's something strange going on in the world that i don't completely understand. In fact i think that media explain us things in the way we regularly don't understand a fuck, it's their job at the end. That's why i took my own informations in a view to try and explain the matter in the easiest possible way.
All right, to better comprehend the reason of the deep crisis involving the world's financial markets we need to know what is an ARM. It means adjustable rate mortgage, that simply represent that kind of mortgage loans where the interest rate that the client is supposed to pay to the bank is periodically adjusted based on a variety of index (i.e. Cost of founds, London Interbank Offered Rate and many others...). The mechanism basing the economic model is very well projected and make the possibility to own an house -or more- very easy. That's why i don't intend the concept founding this economic system as totally wrong, i think that to let people make their dream come true, like owning the house where to live, it's honorable by the way. The system, the concept, the theory, is honorable. Not the men supposed to handle with it.
Let's see in which way this model permitted many people in United States and in many other countries to buy their own house: i wanna buy an house so i go to the bank that after checking my stability give me the money i need. I decide to chose an adjustable rate mortgage because I'm sure the interest rates will drop and I'm also sure the price of the house I'm buying will rise. After three, four years i notice that I'm a lucky guy, and things are going exactly like i planned. If my house's price rise and the interests rate i pay drop, it's exactly the same thing than affirming that i payed more than i effectively payed, the whole economy payed for me part or better everything of my mortgage. Good, in this case i have different options, maybe the gap between rising of houses' price and dropping of rates is that big that it payed my loan in half time, I'm done, I've my house and my money. More frequently people make other plans. For example the bank can tell you that you can renegotiate your mortgage, in the way that for the same amount of the monthly payment you already faced with no particular problem -or, at least, putting a couple of hundreds dollars more-, you can buy a second house. Exactly because the price of the first home you bought rose up and the rates you pay dropped down the bank is offering you to renegotiate. You buy a second house because the free market took charge of most part of the amount you monthly were supposed to pay, that means that with the same amount of money you already planned to pay now you have the chance to have two houses instead of one. Three instead of two. Four instead of three.
At the same time, as you can figure, when houses' price drop and interests rates rise it starts to become more difficult renegotiate a mortgage. If this happen people is not able anymore to face the rising monthly payment and banks don't receive cash anymore. But banks, as you know, are very smart, so i guess it's impossible they couldn't know in advance that something big and really bad was coming soon. That's why I'm sure they invented something called "Securitization". It is an almost new practice with which banks transfer or sell a right to a person, in this case an investor. To make it more understandable the bank transforms the right to receive from a debtor his monthly payments in a certificate that sell to an investor. The investor buy this bank certificate and the interests rate connected. If you know a little bit of economics you surely know that the interest rate of any investment is almost totally related to the risk of the same. In this case, the risk that the bank smartly transfer to the investor (better if small) is called "Credit Risk" and represent the risk that the mortgage holder would not be able to face the payments anymore. And sorry, THE BANKS ARE SUPPOSED TO TAKE IT. These certificates or securities are called mortgages backed securities (MBS) and collateralized debt obligations (CDO), and there is many people that bought this shit to make a good investment, maybe to pay someones grandson university education.
This is the background of the story, of course this caused the domino effect that's under everyone's eye. Firstly banks don't have that much money to finance new enterprises and new investments, people that lost big money with MBS and CDO live in not very good conditions, generally you can attend a crisis of consumption and other stuff like that. NO LIQUIDS.
So i thought: have been changed something in my life after i started and read every single day that Dow Jones got another -6% or that another bank went bankrupt? No. But will anything change? I honestly hope not, but i mean, every day you see on the news that this index lost 3, 4, 5 points, that means that there is more shared sold that bought that day in that market. So the price of them dropped. But this is the risk of investing in a stock market or not? People who decided to allocate their founds on stock market already knew that beside a nice rate of earnings should find an extremely high level of risk...and than, in a few word, people that put money in a stock exchange has many more money somewhere else, so, who the fuck cares? The stock exchange is like the second car or the second house, you can lose it, i care to the people who's losing their only house, or people that invent everyday a way to let their kids eat. I'm actually very happy if some of that mother fucker speculators lose some money. So, the stock exchange doesn't make me worried too much, but, i know, behind the shares they exchange everyday all around the world's markets, there are enterprises and people losing job. Maybe there were enterprises.
Right now the share represent the enterprise, i mean, there was a time when the solidity of a company or the ability and honesty of a management was the base of the share prices, now it's exactly the contrary, empty, bubble companies that base their importance on the daily quotation of their share. If i was working for an empty fake bubble company i think I would notice it right away and right away i would start to look for another job cos i don't think should be that difficult to understand that under the high quotations there's nothing else than speculation when you are inside it. But no body talked. My life didn't change at all, is this a crisis that maybe just involved banks, stock exchanges, house prices (so house owners) and mother fuckers in general without touching all that normal people that handle with normal problems and pay regularly normal rents? I'm going ahead and paying the same rent even if the houses prices dropped.
I'm thinking about that every time i read anywhere articles or big titles about this crisis, everyday i spend without this crisis involve my life and the life of all the normal people i know i face these articles with an always more pronounced smile.
I'll be back on the matter with the funny solutions that the ridiculous world's genial Governors are inventing day by day with a focus on subprime mortgages, the evil invention of banks and i hope to tell you other nice and above all encouraging news, thank you for your time and attention.

-Wikipedia.org-

Mon Song.

The Srokes - Electricityscape

Starting from today I'm gonna post a good-vibe-for-the-week-song every Monday, "Mon Song Post", i also intend to show you the lyrics of the performances. Two reasons: the first, i'll choose the songs above all for the lyrics, and if you're not an english mother tongue it's impossible you'll understand it just listening (i still have this problem after almost two years living in an English speaking country, ok I'm retarded). Second, now we can sing like crazy, guys, that's always good believe. So, enjoy:

Oh, with strangers to impress so near
Old friends don't realize i'm here
I wish two drinks were always in me
I'd pretend i had the perfect day.

Take me to the water
Make me understand
That i was wrong

For me tomorrow is the first day
So please don't tempt me in the wrong way

It's almost after midnight
I can see the city lights, we're here

Change your mind tonight
You belong to the city now
And you're closer now, i know
You belong on the radio

I swear I'll give it back tomorrow
But for now i think that I'll just borrow
And the chords from that song
And all the words from that other song i heard
Yesterday

Change your mind tonight
You belong to the city now
And you're closer now, i know
You belong on the radio

I will not disturb you
I was just returning you a compliment.

Picture of the Week.

As you can see not only the United States have the right men at the right positions to face the economic crisis. This is from yesterday's Paris meeting, they look so smart don't they?

Coming Soon.

Semptember's Gone.

Today's October the 1st. If you are a regular you already know that every first day of the month i constantly invite all of us to watch this incredible documentary narrated by Joaquin Phoenix, feat. Moby.
I spent the first whole month eating no meat at all, considering i started right away after seeing the film it's actually kind of 7 week that i follow this personal, strange, irregular diet. I eat cheese, rarely eggs, rarely fish -mostly sushi- pasta with rich Italian vegetarian sauces and the rest is more or less vegetables. What i can say to you is that i don't miss meat at all, my body feels much lighter and healthier, my mood has changed a little bit as well. My personal experience is that this is a process that involve your soul more than your brain or food taste, that's why i don't condemn meat eaters or i don't blame myself because sometimes i eat a fish or a scrambled egg. I accepted the choice i took in a really soft and natural way, without imposing me anything. In fact if tomorrow i will see again a steak like i used to see it few more than a month ago, I'd surely eat it. Right now what i see is a cadaver, a carcass going to go on decomposition inside my long intestine. But it's not just this that stopped me. I'm thinking so hard and wondering why my mind had changed so quickly and had accepted with no traumas this crazy and absolutely not announced change in my diet habits. The first selfish explanation i gave you it's not enough, but it's a big motivation to stop eating meat. Your health. No body will tell you that all that damn cardiovascular diseases and many many other health problems are due because of the meat we eat. All over the modern world, and of course above all in the modern countries, and of course above all in United States the way to feed and grow up animals, the way to slaughter them, the way to consider them had changed in the last decade of years. People in this world think that the animals we eat are nothing else than robots, non animated species born to eat, or better to be fed, and died to be eaten by us. That's why people thought that was normal feeding beefs with grounded bones coming from the slaughter house always present close the feedlot. Fortunately in 1997 the US authorities banned this crazy practice that brought us to the crazy cows scandal. At this point the managers of the big corporations involved in feeding animals for us had to think to another way to find a really really really really really cheap food to let animal grow up. As fast as possible. In grandfathers time cows were 5/6 years old at slaughters, now they are 14/16 months. Why? Simply because they don't eat the same things they used to eat 50 years ago. Grass. And what they eat? We can say they eat corn that United States produce mostly to feed animals. So, is just corn able to let a cow grow up and be ready to be slaughtered in such a short time? That's not that simple. Corn, nowadays, is a kind of high tech product but is not enough to let a cow ready to be killed in one year. So corn and antibiotics and enzymes and liquid vitamins and synthetic estrogens and protein supplements and, all together mixed up. But we love fat in our steak, so they get from the always present close slaughter house some fat, coming from already 'treated' animals and burn it getting in its liquid form. And then? Mix liquefied fat with corn and the chemicals. And feed animals with that shit. Three times per day. Daily cost: 1.6$. You don't need me to understand that this "food" get into the body of the cows, get into the meat you eat, get into the shit the cow produce. Think about the fact that farmers cannot use that shit as a fertilizer because it's too chemical. I mean if you take it directly from the ass of a cow and put it into the ground it's already too chemical, it's chemical since the production. What do you think about it? I think that all that shit that i guess it's a lot of shit, goes somewhere underground infecting the water we drink and the fruits we eat.
Finally i invite you again to see "Earthlings", you can just click the last icon on your right. I'll inform you when October also will be spent about my personal no-meat experience, and above all I'll be ready to tell you something more about the surprising book that I'm reading on the matter. Thank you for your time and attention.

- Omnivore's Dilemma - Michael Pollan

Update Di Pietro Interview.

I just received an e-mail from President Di Pietro announcing that he won't be able to answer the questions that Peacedrops sent him before next Tuesday, so let's be patient a little bit more. I'd like to take the occasion to inform you that Mr. Di Pietro is promoting a referendum to abolish the "Lodo Alfano" that is a law, approved by Italian majority, and allowing President Berlusconi a total immunization to any form of law, involving rules he can brake covering as Prime Minister or not. Right now, in Italy, if President Berlusconi -like President of Chambers and President of the Republic- kills his wife or an opponent, he cannot be processed. He cannot go to jail until he finish to be in charge, and believe, Berlusconi intends to stay in charge for a long time. This is a ridiculous, pre-dictatorship bill, that a corrupt Parliament approved in a record-time and that Italian President Granfa Giorgio Napolitano countersigned even shortly. Mr. Di Pietro is trying to cancel this offense from Italian codes like the tribunal in Milan did sending to the Italian Constitutional Court a bill called "eccezione di incostituzionalita" in which some judges are asking the Court to pronounce about a law that make 4 Italian citizens different from the rest in front of a judge or law in general. The article number 3 of the beautiful Italian Constitution said clearly that every one of the Italian citizens is absolutely equal in front of the law, no matter religion thoughts, sex orientations, politics ideas. There's no doubts that Silvio Berlusconi's bill won't have a long life, as every Italian free intellectual knows this law is too much unconstitutional, so the court will abolish it for sure, like it did a couple of years ago when Berlusconi firstly tried to approve a bullshit so big (Lodo Schifani). In the mean time, as i told you, Antonio Di Pietro is collecting signatures to promote the "Refefendum Abrogativo" of the Lodo Alfano. I hope I've been clear enough, so stay tuned for the next week's interview and thank you for your time and attention.

Slacker Uprising.

First of all I'd like you to know that i love Michael Moore. I cannot say i saw every single thing he did but i really and deeply appreciated movies like Sicko, Bowling for Columbine, Fahrenheit 9/11. About him as a filmmaker i cannot tell you anything else. I love his activism and his straight opposition to war and any form of oppression. I enjoyed and learned many things reading his articles, maybe he's the man that mostly contributed to my personal discover of the truth about what happened in New York 7 years ago. The world's signals that continue to explain this truth to me are better understandable when you enter in a sort of point of view that i got because of him and his works. And i thank him very much for this.
Second, i watched the last Moore's movie totally and totally legally for FREE. You know, i always appreciate when someone, really good in doing what he does, gives the fruit of his creativity and work for free, it's a kind of noble act that can only give honor and respect to the man who does it.
Third, ok maybe sometimes I'm a little bit stoned, i confess, some other times i feel like purely stupid, but what i can tell you is that i got "Slacker Uprising" like the story of the tour that Michael Moore did to document the new hope of people following Obama's electoral tour and to invite them to invite other many people to vote. I got it was this campaign, in fact watching the trailers i felt something, a little duck skin coming, an up coming tear, right away. So, it's my fault cos I'm sure i didn't approached the movie with the right expectations.
Fourth, as i think you get by the way i write, I'm not American. I don't think i feel things in the same way Americans do...i mean of course i cried when Balboa ended the cold war on the ring with the American flag on his shoulders as many times i felt excited or cried watching Michael Moore's movies. And when, this last time it didn't happen i put the responsibility on the fact that I'm not American at the point to be interested or involved in something so bad and happened so long ago. The disastrous lost of any hope for all that people that knew what could mean other 4 years with psycho-Georgie make me sad any time i think at the 2004 American elections. My dark remembers of that electoral tragedy don't need to be refreshed. What i mean is that I'm not that into American politics to get involved in something so dated and expired for me. Actually if you think that we are talking about an electoral tragedy that everyone of us is hoping won't happen again, this give to the movie that touch of "terrible-delusion-again-around-the-corner" that made me feel really depressed, minute after minute, watching Slacker Uprising. No duck skin and tears this time...but a little feeling of scare.
Fifth, i hate to do this, and i hate to criticize a person that i really respect, i hate me because I'm doing it, but i think the change that can come with the new president also means deep honesty and peaceful acceptance of critics, anywhere coming from. That's why I'd love you to get this message absolutely not like a critic to Michael Moore as a person or as an expert filmmaker, the critic i feel to move is about timing and quality of the contents.
I'm not a movie critic, and i don't intend this blog like a movie review, there's people who does it better than me, but, honestly i cannot hide the thoughts that came into my mind watching the Slacker Uprising. You wanna know why? It's very simple, because i posted the "coming soon picture" before watching the movie, of course being sure that I would love it. I had no doubts. Ok, once i saw it i had these three options: cancel the coming soon, lie to you or tell you my real point of view. My real point of view this time doesn't match that much with the one of a person that i take as an example for every one of us, it's very easy for me to write bad about Berlusconi, it's not that easy when you talk about Michael Moore. Fuck.
Sixth, lately and incredibly, really important people of science or politics accepted to make talk interviews with this blog, unfortunately i started and think that i can get an interview from anyone i want at anytime... this bad and really regretful behavior pushed me to write an e-mail to Michael Moore asking him for an interview about this last movie. Of course -but fortunately- he didn't reply, so i just care to precise that what I'll affirm and what i already -sorry- affirmed is absolutely not connected to the fact that Mr. Moore didn't reasonably reply to me.
Ok, let's finally start, what's wrong with timing? Next November 4th the United States of America are going to face one of the most important presidential elections of their history. Maybe the most important. What people need is to finally find again a guide, a president who's able to run this country in a complete different way, a president that can be able to make America loved all across the world like it used to be. People want to feel emotions hoping something better for the future. Michael Moore shot Slacker Uprising 4 years ago, why did he need to publish it now? Why not right after the big delusion as a gift for all the people that hoped so strongly for a change? I mean, the whole structure of the movie is well working just in the case of 2004 democrat victory, but I'll talk about this later, for now i just wonder why he didn't choose another time to put this movie under the eyes of the world. I cannot understand why a smart guy like Michael Moore didn't get the fact that 4 years represent an era in the internet era. That's why i found expired the movie since its first seconds. Expired and boring. I don't comprehend the sense of watching a movie like this right before the most important American election. At the beginning of the movie you can read about John Kerry: "Even if he'd known in advance that Bush was lying about weapons of mass destruction in Irak, he still would have vote for the war". And so? Who cares? Who is John Kerry? Where is he? Who remember him? And above all, who's missing him? Come on, this politician disappeared right away after the elections -did he appear anytime?-. So Michael, it's really too late to talk about Karry, and it's very very late to complain about Bush's second failure. It's done. Finished. Over. Now we need to go ahead.
I also tried to explain to myself that maybe everything was made by Michael Moore in a view to support Obama's campaign but not in a too direct way. Maybe there's an American law that forbid to make a movie about the campaign of a presidential candidate and to let people see it little more than a month before the elections. So Mr. Moore took the old story of the 2004 elections to refresh hope and will to vote and attempted to recycle the old, expired, boring, bad ended story connecting it with the new desire of change you can breathe these last months in this country. Wrong. It didn't work at all. To me of course. I definitively think that this is the worst time to see an historic movie like this, to hope now, in 2008, George Bush not to be another time the President is pathetic and very useless, think also he will never be President again by constitution so what's the matter?
Let me finish complaining a little bit about the quality or poverty of the contents. That's mostly what make me mad with Mr. Moore.
Watching the movie i couldn't believe that i was attending to one the hugest celebrations of a man that i saw in my life. When, for the 10th time, i heard the speaker screaming LADIES AND GENTLEMEN MR. MICHAEL MOOOOORE or when i watched him getting the stage of an arena or a theater for the 15th time i thought i was already sleeping. Unfortunately i wasn't. The center of the movie, the protagonist, is not hope, anger or emotions this time. This time is Michael Moore. And i feel sorry for it.
Ther's another thing i don't really understand: you call 15,000 people in an arena or in a park to tell them to go to vote. They are slackers so you give them clean underwear and noodles. Michael do you really think that someone who comes to your shows and someone who doesn't go to vote can be the same person? In fact, at the minute 11 you asked to the 15,000 people attending your speech who among the audience didn't vote in 2000 and 6 or 7 people stood up to receive noodles and clean underwear. Cos they're slackers right? Come on.
Many things impressed me in a negative way in this horrible film, i just want to leave you telling that i found really weird to see Michael Moore getting the private jet that brought him all across the country or noticing that for him George Bush regularly won the 2004 elections. I hope this is just a mistake and the next movie will impress us like the others, for now i just can invite you to download and see it, and, if you want, let this blog know your point of view. Sorry Mr. Moore and thank you for your time and attention.

Picture of the Week.

First, boring debate between the two candidates. Let's wait next week to see Biden vs. crazy Palin, maybe they'll be funnier and, hopefully, little more involved.

Coming Soon.

I need to apologize because the editing of the interview with Antonio Di Pietro is requiring more time than i expected, his office already sent me an e-mail informing that these last, are very intense days for him...You know, if your job is to try to control Berlusconi's Government in a view to avoid it approves crazy laws, well, i don't think you have that much free time in your life. Hoping to be able to translate the answers at the three questions i sent his office last Tuesday before the end of this week, i invite you (if you are US or Canada resident) to freely download the last Michael Moore's docu-movie at slackeruprising.com (find also in my link list). I'm gonna watch it tomorrow and I'll let you know in a coming soon post. Thank you for your time and attention.

Coming Next: Interview with Antonio Di Pietro.

Antonio Di Pietro at his desk in the Italian Parliament.

It's a big pleasure for me to inform you that Antonio Di Pietro accepted to release an interview with Peacedrops.
So, let's talk a little bit about this man before he tells us what's going on in Italy.
We could say a lot of things about Mr. Di Pietro, about his long and hard career or about the important, Institutional roles he covered during it. Well, I'll do it, but before, I'd like you to know what is my feeling when i think at this man. I see Antonio Di Pietro like one of the last honorable public Italian men, every time i hear his speeches or i read his articles it's like to be in front of a guy that spend every day, hour and second of his life to fight a war for legality, always close to the poorest and "less-connected" people.
Antonio Di Pietro is a strong, lucid, focused, member of the Italian Parliament, Founder and President of "Italia dei Valori" party and this is one of the many reasons why, every Italian knows him.
Surely his charisma and the colorful and extremely clear way he express his ideas are part of the success of the politician, but i think Mr. Di Pietro is not just a successful politician, i think he is a successful man.
I consider a man, who dedicate his life (in Italy) to fight against corruption, power abuses, inequity of justice, a successful man...any way.
A man who can look inside himself -and his past- and see everything clear, a man who can be able to enter and move in the dark palaces of power never being involved in illicit or semi-licit traffics (in Italy), i think a man like this, is what everyone should consider "successful".
You know, anyone of us has different point of views, that's why i guess President Berlusconi doesn't look at him like a successful man, probably for the rich and "botoxed" President the meaning of success is money and power when, on the opposite side, Antonio thinks that it means helping people and cleaninig the Italian bad smelling Institutions. Two different concept of success you see? Consider also that Di Pietro promptly refused the Minister of Internal Affairs that Berlusconi (as a Prime Minister) offered him when he was trying to form his first Government, obviously the position was offered just in a view to close his mouth in a "friendly" way, of course Di Pietro smelled the purpose and right away said: no thanks.
If you know Mr. Di Pietro you don't need to read on wikipedia that he comes from a poor rural family. The position he takes on any issue is enough to understand that the people he tries to protect come from the same social status where he comes from. He was born in 1950 in a small village called Montenero di Bisaccia, in the Molise region (south-east Italy), very young he migrated to Germany where he used to work in a factory (in the morning) and in a sawmill (in the afternoon), to pay his studies. These many sacrifices let him get the degree in law whom permitted him to be hired as an officer in the Italian Police (Polizia di Stato). Antonio Di Pietro spent just a few years in serving the state as a police man, after which he started the judicial career as a prosecutor. Was in 1992 when, together with other famous judges (Borrelli, Boccassini, Colombo, Davigo...), he founded the "Mani Pulite" (clean hands) team, which investigated on political-financial corruption. Mani Pulite cleaned, like an house keeper with a vacuum, the Italian Institutions which unfortunately got dirty again very soon because of Berlusconi that, seriously risking the prison, decided to get into the politics challenge. He won the1994 national elections, he became Prime Minister and consequencially saved the skin.
Romano Prodi formed in 1996 his first Government, after the center-left victory, and called Antonio Di Pietro to serve as Minister for the Public Works with competences on all what was primarily object of bribery. The Di Pietro politician had right away a good relationship with people, just because he talks directly to people, like me for example. The success of his politics effort pushed him to found a party called "Italia dei Valori" (Italy of Values) in 1998, making its main theme the fighting against political corruption in Italy. The condescendent attitude of left-wing politicians like Massimo D'Alema towards Berlusconi, imposed him to not run together with the center-left coalition in the general elections in 2001, which were won by Silvio Berlusconi. Di Pietro just got the 4% who permitted "Italia dei Valori" to get into the Parliament, with 1 senator. Unfortunately he immediately defeated to Berlusconi's party. So strange.
Antonio Di Pietro got a seat at the European Parliament in 2004 and in 2006 he run again for the general elections and again, with Romano Prodi, won. He was chosen as Minister of Infrastructures in the second Prodi Government.
We are living the rest. Right now Di Pietro is fighting against the Berlusconi Government with all the weapons that a democracy can let him use. Every day Mr. Di Pietro fiercely enters the Italian Parliament and tells to the Prime Minister what he thinks about his way to run the country. No matter if Berlusconi never shows up at the Parliament, the important thing is that we have a man, inside an Institutional palace, in Italy, that tells Silvio Berlusconi exactly what he deserve because of the ridiculous laws his government is approving every day. Note that the laws that Berlusconi propose to the Parliament every day -approved in 95% of cases- are written by his smart lawyers, Parliament's members as well. Well, fortunately some one stands up screaming: SHAME ON YOU! Every day. Thank you very much for that Mr. Di Pietro.
So, such a man decided to talk with us and answer to a couple of questions, i don't need to remind that this is a great honor for me and for this blog. I hope you'll enjoy this great Peacedrops guest reading his interview in the next coming post.
Thank you for your time and attention.

Many thanks to Mrs. Fabiola Paterniti, Capo Ufficio-Stampa President Di Pietro and Mrs. Sara Mangieri, National Vice-Coordinator of "Italia dei Valori" party.

-Wikipedia.org - Governo.it -

Picture of the Week.

Berlusconi & Friends' plan to save Alitalia failed.

Coming Soon.

Moby - Everloving

Picture of the Week.

Bankrupt.

Interview with Tommaso Dorigo.

Tommaso Dorigo with Nobel Prize Winner James Bjorken, 1996.

Tommaso Dorigo, Particle Physics Researcher at INFN - Universita' di Padova.
CDF (Fermilab-Illinois)
LHC (CERN - Switzerland).

PD: PeaceDrops
TD: Tommaso Dorigo

PD: First of all thanks again for the kindness you demonstrated during these last busy and intense days for your works and passions. So at the end it looks like we survived your experiment. I'm so glad about that, but can you explain me why on the web, and not only, we assisted at that really exaggerated media coverage? People scared about creation of black holes, others looking at the money you honestly get to let human kind a step ahead in evolution... i mean do you think is this the right way to inform about an experiment that you tell me it was not that scientifically interesting?
TD: I accept with pleasure to talk a little bit about this mega-media-event, on air Sept 10 and focusing on the launch of LHC accelerator at CERN in Geneve. I repeat, that was purely a mass-media event, if you consider that the proton beam already did half way in the recent past days, there was no reason to think it wouldn't finish. There was 1/million of the protons that will normally circulate in the accelerator next year, the energy produced by this experiment is equivalent at 6.7% of the energy at a level of full regime, when the beams will have the same energy of a navy air-craft carrier at a speed of 60 km/h...the protons that circulated in LHC last Wednesday generated the equivalent energy of an old fat lady riding her bike. I admit: it was a really well built and organized mass-media event. I think CERN did the right thing taking an advantage from the hystery due to this ridiculous feeling of risk of black hole creation and did good in being able to transform legal sues, placed against CERN by ignorants looking for media visibility and easy success, in advertising (for free). An advantage for science that took all the benefits of media speculations and finally, for a day became protagonist. Anywhere. We need more occasions like these to let common people really understand why we do what we do, why our studies are so important for everybody, why 10 billion dollars spent to build LHC and its detectors are easy stuff compared to the US Department of Defense that spend more that 10 times that sum of money per year. We needed more that 20 years to spend it. We must let people realize that these researches are helpful for each one of us... this is well spent money, believe, we try to let all the people involved in what we do and i think that some of the things we do should be part of the general culture of everybody. On the contrary we see everyday difficulties in communicate with the world. People is interested in what is hadron-therapy only when they are diagnosticated with a brain cancer, but i wonder...should not be better if they knew it before and pushed with local administrators to install a small accelerator in a closer hospital instead looking at them as health travelers, usually to foreign countries (who can) or more often to long endless waiting lines?
PD: Wow. Thanks again. I feel like Aladin and his desires, mmmhhh... so atoms, electrons, neutrons, elementary particles...all the things that you work with, where are they? Everywhere? In a peace of wood like in an apple? And what's a quark? How can you obtain elementary particles? And what are they?
TD: Even if you don't know you asked me an incredible quantity of things in just a few words. Let's make it simple 'cos you know, I've not that much time and you've not that much interest... in substance protons make atoms, everything is made by atoms, matter is atoms. Protons are made by quarks, and quarks cannot exist far away from protons, they are indissolubly connected with protons by a strong interaction, something that tie them like a rubber band. The harder you try to get a quark outside his proton the more energy you need, until the rubber band breaks (because at that point it becomes energetically more efficient to break than to extend). At the borders of the band, after the collapse, appear two quarks, one quark and one anti-quark each side, the two quark disappear right away (one back in the proton and the other connected with the quark we where trying to take out firstly). So what do we have in our hands at the end? We won't have a quark but a meson, something lighter than a proton and also less stable (expires in billions of a second)... we have an elementary particle. It's just important you know that quark are inside protons, to study and comprehend it is very important in a view to understand the composition of matter at its smallest levels, from these kind of informations we'll be able to see clearer how everything works and maybe we'll be able to put our (sometimes) useless existences at a higher level of knowledge. I'll explain you how do we study quarks with another very simple example. Try to imagine a proton like a garbage bag, you cannot open it to see what's inside, if you absolutely need to open it you are just allowed to launch it against another garbage bag. If you are able to crash the two bags at an enough-powerful energy you won't have just a collision between two garbage bags (that's boring and not interesting), you'll see the two bags explode and a hard collision could take place between a can from a bag and, maybe, a glass bottle from the other. Quarks that constitute protons are bottles and cans, if you're able to break protons and crash quarks each others you'll find a bag full of glass shot to a precise direction and the other full of aluminium that will run to another direction. Very very very fast. These are the particle called "jet" and our detectors are able to measure it. From this we can understand what happened long time ago, at the beginning of everything, we understand what happen to the matter and its structure under very high levels of energy in very small distances, to discover all this we need huge structures like the LHC.
PD: LHC, you are right, it's a huge project. Incredible. What is it exactly for? And is it able to generate black holes? And what are they?
TD: LHC is very important. It will let us discover what really is the mass, and maybe it will show us what exactly is the dark side of the mass that we are sure represent a smaller part in the universe. We'll also be able to understand the reasons why of the assimetry between the presence of matter and antimatter in the universe. Matter and antimatter are nothing than particles with some opposite characteristics (like electric charge), but they both respect the same physics laws. In the universe we observe a lot of matter and not that much antimatter, LHC maybe will tell us why this sort of predominance was created when everything started. Finally black or dark holes. These guys are responsible for the media event of these last days. Dark holes are matter aggregates so dense that the gravitational field they generate is able to don't let even out photons (light). Lhc will not produce dark holes, and even if it could be able to do it in a possible far future, they will evaporate in one billion of million of million of second. By the way we can sleep safe because what LHC does, it happens naturally every second, in our solar system and everywhere else among the universe. We call them cosmic rays and every day they are sent to us from the center of very far away galaxies. They could be able to produce dark holes better than our LHC, but, for now, nothing tells us that we are under any kind of risk. Definitively i hope i convinced you that particle physics can get our existence to a better level.
PD: I think you absolutely did, thank you. And thank you for your time and attention.

- This work is dedicated to the victims of 9.11 -

Coming Next: Interview with Tommaso Dorigo.

As you can figure from the fact we are still alive, fortunately the planet hadn't yet been eaten by a black hole generated in Switzerland, just because, in the experiment that took place this morning, only a beam at time had been circulated in the machine. That means NO COLLISIONS at all or if you prefer no chance to generate any black hole.
That's by the way a good point to start and talk a bit more seriously about a really interesting matter involving lots of the most brighting brains living on this planet.
Starting the researches i did to understand what is going on with this CERN experiment, i got at first an unusual fear feeling circulating through the web. It was like any opinion leader, blogger and sort of internet observer was scared by the fact that science and technology achievements are obtained putting the Earth constantly under the risk to be absorbed by a black hole (and in facts disappear for ever from the Universe) generated by the process that just started this morning in a small town close to Geneve. I mean, there's people who's dedicating to these kind of studies most of their whole life, don't you think they already considered the risk of creating a black hole able to destroy life on earth? I'm talking to all that bloggers that wrote things like: "maybe at this point what we need should be a sort of scientific regression or at least stop research on dangerous projects like the CERN one to avoid to put the planet under such a risk".
I also found exaggerated the compulsive interest showed by TV networks and newspapers, always more interested in scaring people than in treating a scientific news from the real and unique point of view of science (scare to sell).
Maybe, instead of screaming the end of civilization anytime something very new and revolutionary fell on this planet, we could try to take some better informations before throwing onto the web senseless conclusions.
CERN is the European Organization for Nuclear Research and this morning launched the first LHC beam, 2.500 of the most illuminated minds on the face of earth collaborated at the program, and one of these great guys' name is Tommaso. Tommaso Dorigo.
He accepted to make a talk-interview with Peacedrops in a view to involve normal people in a dream that sometimes cannot be lived because of the difficulties in understanding the almost incomprehensible (for people like me) theories founding physic processes.
Dorigo was born on February 5th 1966 in Venice, Italy. He's always been living in Venice apart from a two years parenthesis when he had a position of Post-Doctoral Fellow in Particle Physics at Harvard University and contributed to the construction of the new CDF II detector. Tommaso married MariaRosa in 1998 and they have two kids, Filippo and Ilaria. They all live in Venice where they recently finished remodeling their new house.
Currently Mr. Dorigo is an INFN (Istituto Nazionale Fisica Nucleare) research scientist working at the Universita' di Padova.
He also studied at the Venice Conservatory where he became a Master in Antique Instruments in 1982. At the conservatory he studied composition for four years after that he quit to dedicate his whole time to the study of Physics. Mr. Dorigo studied at the Univerista' di Padova where he specialized in "Experimental Particle Physics", he graduated on June 1995 with a Thesis titled: "The Search for Top Quark in the All-Hadronic Decay with the CDF Experiment". He defended his Ph.D. thesis in Padova in 1999. Later 1999/2000 he worked at Harvard University where he constructed part of the CDF II muon system. From 2001 he was back in Padova where he got a string of 2-years position, after that he won a position as researcher in INFN in the fall of 2005. He is currently a member of the CDF (Collider Detector at Fermilab - Illinois) and CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) collaborations. Most of his research time since 2007 is focused to CMS following (with other 600 Italian scientists) the CERN experiments.
Who better than him could explain to us what's going on over there?
Peacedrops is highly honored to guest such a personalty and if you consider that he is a very easy guy and a devote father and husband, the honor is doubled. Tommaso Dorigo also may contribute to change a little bit the image we all keep in mind when we think about scientists. This time we're dealing with an Italian, young, brilliant, not-so-politically correct, genial Physics researcher. I hope you'll feel involved and enjoyed by all this... coming up on Peacedrops.
Thank you for your time and attention.

- Dorigo.Wordpress.com - Infn.it - Bbc.com - Corriere.it -
- Special Thanks to Antonio, a great friend of mine who first told me about CERN -

Coming Soon.

Picture of the Week.

People of Thailand is fighting against corruption inside its public administration.
This blog support Thailandese protests.

E Pluribus Unum.

As you can see from the coming soon picture, "E Pluribus Unum" is the motto that clearly appears on the seal of the President of the United States of America. It's Latin for "Out of Many, One". Officially there's two different ways to interpret this honorable concept: the first is that out of many colonies or states will emerge just one, powerful nation. The other meaning is that out of many people, races and ancestries will emerge a single people and nation illustrating the concept of "MELTING POT".
What i thought right after i learned this thing is that these two different ways to read this motto are just two different ways to run a country. This concept appears on the President seal, of course it's up to him the way he's gonna understand it. It's so clear the way Mr. Georgie Bush got it, or the way Mr. Clinton did, or Bush father as well.
I waited until the two conventions were over before to post again about this campaign for President of US, just because i was curious about the fact my feelings could change after listening the two acceptance speeches of Mr. Obama and Mr. McCain. My conclusions are that i don't intend to waste many words talking about the boring McCain and Palin (vice-president nominee) speeches. The reason stays inside what they talked about.
Ok, Capitan John McCain after a couple of thank you started his speech sending his gratefully to the actual, tragic, President Bush literally saying: "I'm grateful to the President of United States for leading us in these dark days following the worst attack in American history"...applause..."The worst attack on American soil in our history and keeping us safe from another attack that many, many thought was inevitable. And to the first lady"...applause..."And to the first lady Laura Bush a model of grace and kindness in public and private". It appears quite clear that Senator McCain believe that Bush made a good job only because when he was president it have been no terrorist's attack on US soil. He also believe that it have been no attacks because of Georgie's good job. All right? He also think that his poor wife -the First Lady that of course cannot wait her fucked up husband to finish this damn presidency to divorce- can make a very good Tea.
Now, the iron lady running for Vice-President did even better: "I think God's will has to be done in unifying people to get the gas lines built, so pray for that"..."Pray for our military men and women who are striving to do what is right. Also for this country, that our leaders, our national leaders are sending [US soldiers] out on a task that is from God. That's what we have to make sure that we're praying for, that there's a plan and that plan is God's will".
It looks like Mrs. Palin believe that the wars involving United States are following the (her) God's will. The nominee at vice presidency believe that God could support a war. This is not a religious matter. This is a matter of going ahead telling lies to people pretending to get credit from an always too sleepy public opinion.
Mr. Palin Governor of the State of Alaska, let me tell you something: GOD IS THE OPPOSITE OF ANY FORM OF WAR.
All right, let's get back serious. Obama.
What impressed me at first, listening the Obama's beautiful acceptance speech he made in Denver, was about my working life. He told to the more than 75,000 people at the stadium and to the entire world that he wants an America where if you are a waitress, and you live with tips, you can take a day off to look after your kids without being afraid to loose the job. I mostly live with tips, mostly of the people i love live with tips. So, it was very nice to hear this thing from the man running for President, i enjoyed living that moment, the moment i heard that sentence. Beside this little personal things i very believe that the Obama's speech will remain impressed in the history of this country for many other reasons.
He finally and very clearly told the world what does "CHANGE" mean for his next presidency: "tax goes to American workers and small businesses who deserve it"..."i will cut tax for 95%of all working families"..."in 10 years we will finally end our dependence of oil from the middle east"..."as President i will invest in clean-cold technologies"..."i will invest 1.5 billion dollars of the next decade in affordable, renovable sources of energy, wind power, solar power, and the next generation of BIO-fuel"..."Now it's not the time for small plans, now is the time to finally meet our moral obligations".
Let me reflect a little bit on these few important arguments. 10 years to get independent form middle east, clean energy all over technologically advanced countries and still oil and carbon in the less-at-the-time few remaining countries. But in peace. Less developed countries will contribute more at the pollution than developed world, but the mass will be 90% less than now and the planet will absorb it with no problems. Countries with different religions in peace. With no energy excuses to fight each others. And than peace drops after peace drops...
We need a President that want to become independent from middle east countries because he's running a more advanced country, not just because he won a war or found other oil somewhere else. Oil is over. End of the story, let's start to face with it. So finally someone important, beside Al Gore, talked clearly announcing huge investments in clean energy. Finally.
The stadium also exploded when, after 35 minutes he said: "Surely we can agree that gay and lesbian, brothers and sisters, deserve to visit the person they love in the hospital and to live lives free of discrimination"..."this election has never been about me. It's about you".
The meaning of this last part is that now America has really to choose between two completely opposite ways. Going ahead with a 73 years old prisoner of war or changing with a young black new President. That's mean changing. For real. There's no more time. McCain simply cannot win. If this is what the majority of the population of the most powerful of the countries decide i don't even imagine what can happen in the really next future. I honestly confess that I'm really and seriously scared about it.
We don't have to forget Mr. Joe Biden, the guy who's gonna run for the vice-presidency of the United States. What i read about him is very nice, especially in foreign policy. But honestly the thing that interested me more is the fact that Obama didn't choose Mrs. Clinton. She could bring votes, money and make the life easier inside the Democratic Party. But Barack Obama did not care about it and chose the person who he think is the right person to build the change. No discounts. Especially in change of votes or money, the mechanisms that the new spirit is gonna involve and destroy the most. I cannot wait to see Obama as the next President of the United States. I cannot wait to be part of the change or to see and live it. E pluribus Unum.
Thank you for you time and attention.

- NYTimes - Corriere.it - Wikipedia.org - Alternet.org -

Coming Soon.

So Lonely - The Police - Live Hatfield 24/2/79
A really important person just left New York City, so I'm lonely, but with a rhythm.
We are all gonna miss you BopiDance.

Earthlings

Earthlings
As every 1st day of the month I'll remind you, and me too, to watch this incredible documentary.
Here's the direct link.