Seung-Hui Cho took time to make a video DVD and Express Mail it in between killings

Among the materials released this afternoon were the contents of a DVD with 27 QuickTime video files, totaling about 10 minutes, showing Cho talking directly to the camera. mentions "hedonism" and Christianity, and talks at length about his hatred of the rich.

I just heard about a minute of the Cho audio on KIRO 710 AM. This guy is even more twisted than you might think. Some links:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18169776

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8OJ9LS00&show_article=1

Va. Tech Killer Ruled Mentally Ill by Court; Let Go After Hospital Visit

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Alien Lore No. 102—The Reds Had Their Own Project Bluebook

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According to Pravda, KGB agents recording UFO observations in a Blue Folder. . .not unlike our own government's Project Bluebook. The Blue Folder was declassified years ago. Soviet cosmonaut Pavel Popovich received a copy of the folder from the KGB in 1991. Popovich is now an honorary president of the Academy of Informational and Applied Ufology.

The Blue Folder reports on observed UFO flights and details some attempts by the military to capture some of The Greys.

In 1968, 13 aircraft designers and engineers of the Soviet Committee on Space Technology and Exploration sent a letter, requesting a special organization for the study of UFOs to Soviet Prime Minister Alexei Kosygin. A reply to the letter was sent by an Academician Shchukin:

“A number of competent organizations of the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences in cooperation with the Chief Directorate of Meteorological Service, Defense Ministry and a few other agencies considered the issue of nature of the so-called flying objects. The organizations involved in the study of the atmosphere and space have been instructed to register and do research on any cases of UFOs for identification purposes. The USSR Academy of Sciences is charged with general monitoring of the phenomena, and therefore a special organization for the study of UFOs is not required.”

“It was a real breakthrough,” says Vladimir Azhazha, president of the above academy and keeper of the Blue Folder. “The authorities not only acknowledged the existence of UFOs for the first time, they also showed their great interest in the issue."

According to Azhazha “Pavel Popovich was given the folder after requesting reports on the cases of UFOs. I received the folder from Popovich, it was a 124-page compilation of reports about the encounters with UFOs. The reports filed by authorities, military units COs and eyewitnesses. It took us a long time to get rid of some doubts before making the folder public."

Mr. Popovich saw a UFO once while flying in a passenger plane from Washington to Moscow. The object looked like a shining triangle and flew near the plane at about 600 miles per hour before vanishing into thin air.

Despite the letter that denied the KGB had tracked UFOs, the contents of the folder indicated seem to tell another story. The KGB launched investigations in several cases, for example, an anomaly observed near the village of Burkhala in the Magadan region on October 21, 1989. The report on the incident says: “The eyewitnesses claim to have watched a red shining sphere circulating above the village for half an hour.”

KGB agents never did figure out what happened at the airport of the city of Mineralnye Vody on December 15, 1987. According to the airport dispatchers, at 11:15 PM, flight No 65798 reported seeing an “object resembling an aircraft with its headlights on.” Radar showed no aircraft in the area. The UFO disappeared after three minutes.

The crew of another plane also observed a UFO flying in that area at 11:20. The UFO left a fiery trail in the air. The crews of the both planes reported that the UFO had disappeared after a flash or explosion. A villager saw "a burning plane" flying over his village at 11:30. Eyewitnesses said the plane then disappeared. There was no wreckage or any evidence of a plane crash.

The army at times made attempts to deal with UFOs without KGB involvement. In August 1987, servicemen of an antiaircraft unit based on the Tiksi Peninsula tried to “get to know better” an unidentified flying object that appeared on a radar screen. A report from Colonel Lobanov, a duty officer of a military unit said: “An unidentified target detected by the radar station of the commandant’s office of the antiaircraft unit at 05.45 Moscow time.” The target moved at a speed varying from 0 to 250 miles per hour. At 6:55, a helicopter took off for a closer examination of the object. The object became invisible (or just disappeared). Another aircraft flying in the vicinity at the time reported an green cloud with traces of purple and dark spots visible in the middle

An incident occurred in the Leningrad Military Region in early August of 1987. Five officers were dispatched to the northern part of Karelia to accompany an object of unknown origin that had been located near the city of Vyborg. The object was said to be 14 m long, 4 meters wide and 2.5 m high. The military failed to open the “extraterrestrial can.” Eventually, the object disappeared from the hangar late September.

On July 28, 1989, a UFO caused a panic military personnel near Kapustin Yar, in the Astrakhan region. Corporal Valery Voloshin was on duty in the communications center at the time. He filed a report on the case.

Researchers now believe the Blue Folder is a valuable cache of information. According to Mr. Azhazha, the evidence suggests that intelligent life forms control the objects that mean no harm to human beings. Nothing in the Blue Folder indicates that any UFO had ever taken action against any human. Every single episode the Soviets recorded depicts the aliens essentially performing drive-bys.

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Poem: changes 58/Progress

1
There will be progress
At the end of the line.

There will be good fortune
if you have inward harmony.

Occasions for repentance will disappear.
You will have no more regrets.

2
Sometimes you forget and trust
A person who would injure you.

3
The airs of spring begin to blow
And the vapours rise and descend again.
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33 less Americans: The Virginia Tech massacre

This has been as depressing as any day could be. I don't even feel depressed actually; I'm in the throes of an overwhelming sense of sadness over this reminder of the dark underbelly we sometimes forget about. People say that episodes—no, tragedies—like this is the cost of freedom.

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Painting: The Safe House

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32 killed by shooter on Virginia Tech campus (+ editorial comment)

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Alien Lore No. 101—The oldest known UFO photographs

By Jack Brummet, Alien Lore Ed.

The most interesting information about these photos is that they were all photographed many years before The Roswell Incident, or the Mt. Rainier UFO sightings of 1947—both of which helped catapult UFOs into the popular imagination.

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This photo was taken in 1870 at Mt. Washington, New Hampshire. The photo has been called "the oldest UFO photograph ever taken." This image was the subject of spirited bidding on E-bay in 2002 and was purchased by Samuel M. Sherman, the President of Independent-International Pictures Corp.

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This image was shot in 1927 at Cave Junction, Oregon. The picture was reportedly snapped by a volunteer fireman. Click on to see full size image to really appreciate the picture.

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In 1929 at SlideWard, Colorado, a photographer captured this alleged UFO photograph. According the Hetty Pline, the photographer's daughter "This photo was taken by my father Edward Pline at the sawmill in Ward where we lived at the time, I think it was 1929. I was about six years old then. My father was there to photograph the sawmill for some reason or another, and as he was taking the photo, he described a "terrible thunderous bellow," and a large round thing as big as a very large boulder that moved through the air above them. You can see it in the picture. None of the sawmill workers saw the thing in the photo, but they all heard the sound and felt the ground shudder. Later in my life I tried researching the incident at the County Historical Society, but I did not find any references to it. My father passed on a few years after the incident, and I have not found any surving sawmill workers from that time. "

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In this image, the alarm klaxons installed in the event of a Japanese air raid began blaring, and flying objects are seen and announced in the sky off the city. I have written about this incident before. A blackout was declared and terrified Los Angelenos turned off all the lights.

The anti-aircraft guns opened fire on the UFOs, and as you see in the photo, the projector beams began searching the sky. Many witnesses saw small objects flying at high altitude, of red or silver plated color. The saucers moved in formation at a high rate of speed, and the anti-aircraft artillery were useless. FDR got involved in this one. See the story in All This Is That...

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In May 1932, at St. Paris, Ohio, someone took this picture of George Sutton. It was probably 1932 judging by the license plate on the car. George looks pretty calm for having a UFO hovering over his head. Nobody has been able to account for the dark object seen over Sutton's left shoulder in this photograph.

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Poem: Changes 57/The Gentle

1
The wind that scatters the gathered clouds
leaves the sky clear and serene

a penetrating clarity of judgment
thwarts the dark and hidden motives

a strong leader uncovers and breaks up
the intrigues which shun the light of day

by an influence that never lapses
less striking to the eye

than those won by surprise attack
but more enduring and complete.

2
Only when the insidious influence
works always in the same direction

can the object be attained
the winds follow one upon the other

the penetration of the wind
depends upon its relentlessness

in advance
and in retreat.

3
Gentleness is taken to the point of indecision
and one does not act resolutely

a thousand doubts crop up
as you play out the what if scenarios

resolute discipline is far better
than irresolute license

at times one has to deal with hidden enemies
—intangible dark and nefarious—

that slink into dark corners
and affect people by suggestion

you must trace these things back
to the secret crevasses

to determine the nature of the threat
and then delete the influences

when these influences are exposed
they lose their power over people

deliberation brings fresh doubts and scruples
when you are unable to act

no beginning, but an end
before the change and after the change.
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It was 95 years ago today that Titanic sank—"Woman and children first!"

95 years ago today, the RMS Titanic sank on its maiden voyage. You know the grim story (if you don't, go here). . .it was a tragedy of errors.




The Titanic's rudder and propellors



The "unsinkable" RMS Titanic would have escaped the tragedy if the crew had seen the iceberg ten seconds earlier, or ten seconds later. It was a night when everything went wrong. Of a total of 2,223 people, only 706 survived. Most of the lifeboats left the Titanic half-full. No one really believed there was an emergency until the ship began listing, an hour and a quarter after initially striking the 'berg. From there is went down fast. The ship broke in two and each half sank.





The fatal iceberg


60% of the first class passengers were saved.
44% of the second passengers were saved.
25% of the third class passengers were saved.
24% of the crew were saved.
80% of the people who died were men.
50% of the children died



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The LBJ Museum and Library in Austin

I took my second trip to the LBJ Library on the University of Texas campus yesterday. There were a lot of great exhibits as usual, and especially the one on the Electrification of Rural Texas. If you get a chance to go to Austin, don't miss this place. Hero or monster, or both, LBJ was a key president, and probably did more for African-Americans than any President since Lincoln.

The library is not afraid of showing all the contradictions in this often tortured, frequently cranky, and always ambitious man. LBJ often frequented the library in the last years of his life...

On campus, you can also see the Tower. The tower is where the first mass shooting of innocents occurred in America—a harbinger of what was to come, really. It is where the first American parallel killer went bananas. Charles Whitman went up in the tower in 1966, and killed fourteen people and injured dozens more in a little over ninety minutes. They closed the tower for over 20 years, but it reopened a few years ago. To get up there you have to pass through metal detectors, and there are armed guards on the observation deck.






Other recent postings on LBJ:

LBJ responds to White House correspondent Dan Rather (and links to other LBJ photos) (has links to dozens of great photos).
Three more photographs of LBJ
Jerry Seinfeld Called Them The Close Talkers, Or, The Study Of Proxemics
LBJ responds to White House correspondent Dan Rather (and links to other LBJ photos)
LBJ meets FDR
Photograph: LBJ howls like a dog
Another good LBJ photograph - circa 1960
Photograph: LBJ in Vietnam
Photograph: LBJ agonizing over the Vietnam War
Photograph: LBJ and MLK meet up
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The Old 97's show at Stubb's BBQ was a rainout . . .but the Small Stars were great!

click to enlarge The Small Stars

I went to Stubb's BBQ in Austin for the Old 97's/Small Stars show. Maybe twenty minutes after the last Small Stars tune, the skies opened with some fantastic Texas thunder & lightning and win and rain. The ticket-taker earlier told me no, it won't start raining until midnight. Now, I have some Seattle rain cred. and am, in fact, a rain fan. There was water in the air. It was about 80, with humidity in the high-90s. . .in other words a couple percentage points from being an actual mist. I was not shocked to see the rain.

I did not get to see the Old 97s, but I did get to see the Small Stars as the opening act. And they were great!

Small Stars are a quirky melange of influences. In a good way! Miles Zuniga, is in another band, Fastball. Small Stars have a great buzz in Austin. Read more about them and hear a song here. My favorite song title of the show: "That's What God Made Whiskey For." The Small Stars play funny, seriously rocking songs, with great chops and a lot of theater and vamping. With these guys, it's a nice schtick. . .a nice balance between hard rock and alt+country with maybe a whiff of Zappa and The Kinks and Big Star and The Beatles and even maybe a touch of Bongwater, the Dukes of Stratosphere, Wheezer, and finally a good-blast of Tex-Mex and the Austin sound. I liked them a lot. And they came across as really nice, guys. . .weird as they were. Christopher Gray wrote in the Austin Chronicle: "A rare example of a half-baked concept fermenting into a full-fledged band, Austin’s Small Stars smooth-talked noted L.A. engineer Bob Clearmountain (AC/DC, INXS) into brightening the edges of their self-released sophomore effort, Tijuana Dreams, out of pocket no less. Which would be all for pristine-sounding naught if their lounge-lizard tales of showbiz delusions and debauchery didn’t cut frighteningly close to home." Buy their record!
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The Old 97s in Austin

I am going to see the Old 97s tonight at Stubbs' in Austin. It should be a great show in the dirt courtyard there.

These guys are an alt-country band (think Whiskeytown, etc). But better: great guitars, harmony, fantastic lyrics, melody, and a power pop sheen. I am including a video below from You Tube.


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