No, It's Not A Flagpole...

I hold no great brief for or against the "flagpole." But do wish to note that many churches in fact enjoy the extra income that results from letting cell phone companies use their steeples for their own aerials. Perhaps the area Lutherans cited here are simply better off financially than other congregations?

As to studies that hint at long-term health risks from wireless transmission facilities, well, the "solution" is obvious: give up your cellphones so that others (even in red states like, say, Kansas or Indiana) may live. Yet somehow I doubt that's going to happen in Baristaville.

I am looking forward to better signal in that area of Montclair. I have often had a dropped call while in the area. (near Watchung Plaza, no?)

"...the size of the proposed tour...."

A 3-hour tour perhaps? ;=)

Oops!

The town and the wireless phone company should consider microcell technology instead. A small network of microcells are less unsightly and have a less powerful signal while providing equal coverage.

mikey should know...he's an expert in low power "microcells".

If it is built on Church property, must the antenna be both a mono-pole and a tri-pole simultaneously?

ROC, I know enough unlike you who knows nothing on the subject. You keep writing that PR.

Mikey, put me down too as someone who thinks you know quite "enough" already.

Did anyohe else notice that on the local Lutheran church's website there's a quote from St. Francis? Thus from a church that hasn't created any new saints itself since the time of its founding by Luther?

And the writing above makes it sound as if the parish itself distributed fliers indicating how "ugly" (an automatically judgmental and pejorative word there) the proposed tower would be. Why would the parish do that if, as I gather now, the tower is meant to be on church land? A case of spiting Peter to pay Paul?

Perhaps the solution for good Baristavillians of relative conscience is simply not to get their cell service from T-Mobile.

Wouldn't you need a large number of microcells to replace a conventional base station?

I'm not and expert on such matters, but after a cursory search of the internet there are also concerns about radiation from microcells. Even though they are lower in power, they are also located much lower to the ground ie closer to people.

See
"Stealth base stations more damaging"
http://www.greenhealthwatch.com/news/latest/latest0701/skin-cancer-fm.html

Again, I am no expert, but it is important to remeber that there are no magic bullets. Some solutions to problems may be better than others, but there are always trade offs. Whether it is nuclear power vs hydro-power vs coal vs wind or micro-cells vs macro-cells vs landlines vs satellite, there is no perfect answer.

I'm not and expert on such matters, but after a cursory search of the internet there are also concerns about radiation from microcells. Even though they are lower in power, they are also located much lower to the ground ie closer to people.

See
"Stealth base stations more damaging"
http://www.greenhealthwatch.com/news/latest/latest0701/skin-cancer-fm.html

Again, I am no expert, but it is important to remeber that there are no magic bullets. Some solutions to problems may be better than others, but there are always trade offs. Whether it is nuclear power vs hydro-power vs coal vs wind or micro-cells vs macro-cells vs landlines vs satellite, there is no perfect answer.

"Public exposure to radio waves near GSM microcell and picocell base stations"

"...This project reports the results from visits to 20 randomly chosen microcell and picocell transmitter sites and finds exposures comfortably within accepted guideline levels, even when people are standing directly beneath the antennas. Nevertheless, exposures can be higher than with macrocells because people can approach nearer to the antennas"

http://www.srp-uk.org/publjoursum.html

what happened...this site is more boring than chris matthews talking to keith olbermann...where's the outrage...where are the leftist loonies? Please someone call me a right wing wacko...karl rove wannabe...or nappy headed neo-con apologist...

Ok Ice, how's this.

Omygod, radiation from cell towers causes floridation!!!
It is a plot to get people to fry their brains so badly with their cell phones that they will vote republican.

Is that better.

What's truly depressing, bitpusher, is that between when you nicely put up your mock incendiary post and now, nearing 7AM, nobody seems to have posted anything on this entire site. This "place" is officially now deadsville.

If this is the price of registration, it is a high price indeed. The amazing thing about Baristanet used to be that it attracted so many insomniac loons. Walleroo, for example, seemed especially active as Venus became slightly visible in the skies. And laserlad replied to anything he viewed as an aspersion upon his grasp of reality at any hour.

Whether these folk and so many others had "lives" of enotional fullness and physical companionship is somewhat beside the point here, they were always ready to post and froth and thus were predictable in their seeming isolation and alienation. Now, however, I get up at 6AM because the workmen are coming to power-wash my building, I check baristanet to see what's transpired since Jay Leno sent me to slumber and I learn NOTHING has. This is not good. We are all sluggards now when it comes to posting (since the likes of walleroo and mikey still live, as far as I can gather, and even Iceman last signed off around 9:30 PM), and the publicity Baristanet used to properly garner for its lively discussions and the number of yelpers would be both impossible and unearned these days.

Someone pinch me . Because i have to agree with cathar on this subject

We're all over on fark posting like always.

Iceman, I think cathar is stalking you. Better watch out, he'll show up at your house with Jim Morrison in tow!

Perhaps I can redirect this conversation-the issue at hand is that the church is attempting to put up an 80' tower a few feet from one of our Montclair homes. Should this application be approved, the precedent for cells towers in other residential neighborhoods (including yours) has been set.

I concur. Can we go back the old way of doing things? I don't mind registering for the forums but I like the main site the way it used to be. How about a vote?

"But do wish to note that many churches in fact enjoy the extra income that results from letting cell phone companies use their steeples for their own aerials"

True, but antennas mounted on existing structures, such as steeples or water towers, are not as noticeable and do no detract from the esthetics of the neighborhood.

From what I understand the tower is 3 feet at its base and much thinner where visible at the top. It will stand in a cluster of trees behind the church that are themselves 60 feet high! That street already has Montclair High School on it, a train station and the plot behind the church is a municipal site / recycling center. Are we really worried about the asthetic affect on the neighborhood? The tower has to be somewhere folks if we want to keep chatting on the cell phones. Do the complainers use cell phones? Do they have microwave ovens? We're at war folks and THIS is what people are protesting about??? Please get a life.

So, are you saying that it is NOT a residential neighborhood? Or that you would like it positioned behind your house.

Yes we are at war- at war with concerns that don't care about our health and the health of our kids. Do we want this positioned near the high school? What kinds of studies have been done to exposure to these kinds of tranmissions.

Would you buy a house near high voltage power lines?

How about a compromise. The Church gets its additional income from the cell towers- but that income is taxed, as cell phone companies are not exempt from taxitation.

We had this issue in Bloomfield a few years ago amd if I remember it was the issue of taxing the cash that made the Church give up the towers. Does anyone else remember.

And I like the new site - I just don't have as much free time with my current position and school at night!

"the church is attempting to put up an 80' tower a few feet from one of our Montclair homes. Should this application be approved, the precedent for cells towers in other residential neighborhoods (including yours) has been set."

Tha answer is no, no, no. The church should be ashamed of itself. They become hypocrites by screwing their neighborhood. I find this disgusting on the part of First Lutheran.

Miss M
I'm with you....count my vote to return to "the old way of doing things."

Please take the registration issue to the forum. Thank you.

Take it to the forums
Lead me through the chamber,
Take it to the forums,
I am but a stranger.

Actually, mikeypal, the proper place to discuss the "registration issue" is right here, since the very process of registration seems to deter commentary (but not from you, for some weird reason). You are much welcome to the forums, however, since I note you created so many threads on them (and even tout onein your posting handle). Attaboy!

I mean, mikey, you wouldn't want to be accused of stifling free and open discussion, now would you?

People use cell phones, Belletones, and so there is a need for transmission towers. Although studies have been done on the harm from cell phone radiation, many health experts consider them inconclusive. However, the main worry is people putting cell phones--which are actually fairly powerful transmitters--right up to their ears, only a centimeter or so from brain tissue. If you're truly concerned about this, I suggest you direct your campaign to persuading people to use headphones.

A far more urgent threat to public health is rampant use of automobiles, which emit a number of noxious pollutants--particulates and carbon monoxide, to name two--many of which are known carcinogens. Perhaps your energies would be better spent in riding your bicycle in lieu of your car, and persuading others to do so, too.

Why Walleroo, that is a brilliant analysis, and just the kind of thing we've come to expect from you, the most reasoned and reasonable of all possible posters. You are a credit to your species.

Why thank you, cathar.

Oh, no, the greater honor is mine. Long Live Walleroo!

For he's a jolly good fell-ow,
For he's a jolly good fell-ow,
For he's a jolly good feeeeelll-ooooooow,
Which nobody can deny.

Oh, cathar, you flatterer, you.

ha ha ha ha HAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAAHAH

(catch me if you can!)

Please take the registration issue to the forum. Thank you.

There's something imperial about this post, isn't there? The poster seems to be one of those people who would be prone to abusing power, if he had any, which thank goodness he does not. This is an already dreary site, and now we're supposed to abide by the random edicts of this small man to make it even drearier. Phie on you, I say! Ecce Nincompoop!

imperious, i meant.

I agree with you, walleroo, there is something Imperial about that post.

Imperial:
of superior or unusual size or excellence

I also agree that you couldn't have written it, because of your small mind and large waist.

"Although studies have been done on the harm from cell phone radiation, many health experts consider them inconclusive."

meaning that they have no idea as to the long-term effects or the effects on children.

"The poster seems to be one of those people who would be prone to abusing power..."

Lord help us.

There will be no levity on this site! :0

That's the spirit, Hiding! Bravo! Way to pump one! That's what we're missing here.

Indeed, not knowing means just what it sounds like -- not knowing. Congratulations for figuring that out. I happen to be one of those skeptics who don't believe that the danger of cell phone towers (or power lines) to the health of children has been ruled out. We agree on that much.

What you fail to grasp--and I'll say it once more only--is that a cell phone held to the ear is likely to be a far greater threat than cell phone towers, due to the proximity of the radiation to sensitive tissues of the brain (a vulnerability you may not have to worry much about personally). Likely, mind you. Not conclusively.

One thing we're pretty sure of, however. Cars are a very large threat to public health. What kind do you drive?

An Alpha Mom chatting on a cell phone while driving her mammoth SUV is more dangerous to one's health than any cell phone tower could ever be.

Anyone else concerned about the speculation that cell phone tower transmissions are believed to be a possible cause of honeybee hive failure? It is known that bee hives are falling apart in alarming numbers, and that the honeybee population is declining. One theory is that their homing instinct is scrambled by the cell phone emissions & they can't get back to the hive. I know my garden, which should be teeming with them now, is eerily silent.

The "security" of the system in use here has been breached yet again, walleroo. That was not an exchange twixt me and thee above. (Didn't you do something similar, using my name, on the Forums?) I was watering my dahlias when that dialogue went down. My true last post is dated 1:35. Tom Biro, Liz, Debbie, are you istening?

Still, I commend you this time on the proper use of "ecce." (Which has to prove this is the Cathar who so enjoys trading jollities with thee.)

I'm on this. The user who is manipulating this - and is not logging in as cathar, but using other methods - will hear from me.

Oh, you knuckleheads, it was I. Geesh. I warned you about this bug months ago, Tom, and you've been sitting on your duff ever since. For a modest fee (or a cyber-date with Liz) I'll let you know how I did it.

Are your ears burning Walleroo -- I just got off the phone with Tom and we know it's you. Very naughty, indeed. I think we're going to have to have a talk.

Oh, I know it was you, just as I knew the last time it was you. Your IPs for your commenting here and your logging into the network, along with your email address left with the other names you choose to use kind of gave that away. When I said "the user who is manipulating this" I wasn't saying it in the manner of not knowing who you were, I was actually just being polite and not pointing it out. Not that anyone couldn't have figured it out on your own.

As far as what you've done, I'm about 99% sure I know what it is, as there's only two or three ways to do this that I've ever heard of. Now I get to close the loop on that, too.

Is commentary being stifled by registration, or by the fact that response time once you hit "Post" has not been improved? Wel

My posting frequency has decreased because of the response-time issue, I just get so tired, so tired of waitng & usually decide not to bother even when I fancy I might have something to say.

Cellphones & bees - there was some mucking about in the UK where they determined that active phones left next to hives keep the bees from re-entering. Most affected hives don't have phones lying about, & many are in areas far from cell towers, so it's likely not the culprit.

And if the bees disappear, yes, we are screwed.

Crank: How sure are you that
most hives don't have cell phones lying about, and many are in areas far from cell towers? Seems to me, cell phones are ubiquitous...and in my opinion, a scourge.

Okay, the culprit has been unmasked. And a pitifully pouched specimen he turns out to be, naturally. Mr. Middle-Aged Eucalyptus Eater himself, the very critter who occasionally runs on lustfully here as a sad index indeed of his "satisfaction.".

I'd post sometime as you, walleroo, but really, I've never been quite that banal or lacking in verbal oomph. But if you ever do it again, I will track you down, fill your pouch with sulphuric acid and stuff your head down there till the flesh bubbles off your nose and cheeks, and then I will use the bone across your forehead for a fly swatter. You have a nice day now, marsupial boy.

"Researchers had concluded..." - I read it somewhere. Probably red herring.

"What you fail to grasp--and I'll say it once more only--is that a cell phone held to the ear is likely to be a far greater threat than cell phone towers, due to the proximity of the radiation to sensitive tissues of the brain (a vulnerability you may not have to worry much about personally). Likely, mind you. Not conclusively. "

Walleroo,

Each individual can control how much they use their own cell phone. I view it like cigarette or cigar smoking, you know it's bad for you but still choose to do it.

Not the cell tower is something else and shouldn't be put in a residential area.

You don't have to speak slowly for me you wanker but it might be nice if you listened to what I have to say.

And now I have better and more pleasing items to address this evening.

Perhaps the registration is driving the honeybees away also.

Nope, just the nameless trolls.

I'm back and I'm not a nameless troll...I am the Iceman...I am the Walrus...coo coo ca choo.

thanks for the shout out bitpusher...I put my cell phone to my ear and I got a side affect that 4 hrs and I had to call my doctor.

Mazie...you're a tree hugging, peta pimping, gore gushing liberal...now cmonb, you 'old' posters...didn't that feel good.

Neocons rock!

Ah, just like old times...kinda. Good to see you back, Iceman.

Wanker! I haven't been called that since second grade in Bethnal Green.

Have a talk? Oh Liz, love of my life, would that I could....

Tom, I feel safer already knowing you're on the case. I imagine you hopping onto a horse and galloping off like Dudley Doright.

Unmasked, cathar? Could I have made the mask more transparent? I chose to impersonate you, a harmless Wallaby. I chose to put words in your mouth that you'd never say, praising me unabashedly (though I know deep down in your heart you really, really love me). And I left my frickin email address, practically a calling card for Tom. Gee, you guys are a veritable Scotland Yard.

Walleroo (and can marsupials, you know, "wank?," don't your claws get in the way), I think Liz means a "chat" of the sort Sister Miriam used to administer in grade school: hung for an hour in the cloakroom by the hang tag on the back of your button down shirt, like a piece of dead game, until it was time for catechism class.

In any case, your prank now seems a funny one, the harmless grasping at emotional straws by a sexually frustrated critter, who is more to be pitied than condemned.

And see, mikey, registration hasn't quite worked out the way you thought it would. It hasn't, for one solid example, allowed you to accumulate any more "dignity" than you had in the days of "nameless trolls." You remain lasermikey!, with all the limitations (and buiot in expiration dates for relevance) contained therein.

Dignity.... what would you know about dignity?

If this small prank is the trade off for dealing with troll spam, I'll take it. You are only taking issue because the joke is on you.

Crank, thanks for the feedback on the posting. Definitely something I've been working on, but with 130k comments on this blog, and still in the hundred-two hundred ballpark per day across the site, it's about figuring out which software optimization works right for everyone, but I have a few ideas for speeding things up that have to do with the front page, so hopefully that'll happen soonest.

cathar,

Boy are you out of touch (hahaha).

Have you seen the "claws" on some women these days?

No wonder nail salons seem to be the most popular store popping up in baristaville these days!

I did like the airy persiflage between you and walleroo earlier but didn't believe your side of the conversation since it was so nice.

There is a lot of evidence that microwaves cause damage to the brain, eyes, developing fetus, CNS, etc.

The person who said that there was no evidence is lying.

Otherwise, why would there be exposure limits on electromagnetic radiation? Look at the research being done in Europe and elsewhere, not here. Here the medical industry has a financial incentive to keep people sick, there it is to keep them well.

Here are some pictures of cell phone antennas 'in groves of trees'

Here are some pictures of cell phone antennas 'in groves of trees'

http://waynesword.palomar.edu/faketree.htm

If you really seek the hollowest of exchanges, HidingIn..., you might begin chatting regularly with lasermikey. Or simply continue wanking by yourself. (Speaking of airiness, I'm sure.)

And mikey, mikey mikey, what you don't get, what you never get, is that walleroo always has a charming tone to his posts. While you just splutter haplessly in your assaults upon the English language. Dignity is non-existent when you post, along with the rules of grammar and spelling. You hector and stamp your feet, and your feathers are always ruffled. Your every post is a "prank" of sorts, one foisted by God upon us. You who would play censor here for everyone else, you just don't have the intellectual ability to post constructively in a fashion that might even semi-sway someone to your viewpoint. Yet rather than bother to hone your own woeful verbal skills, your solution is always the same: censorship (and more censorship) and registration. Walleroo is a silver-tongued marsupial devil of charm, by contrast you are just a frothy cross between Elmer Fudd and Yosemite Sam.

and you, cathar, aka football boy, are drowning in verboseness.

Can you craft a simple and direct sentence. I doubt it.

Looks great andiamo. We should get the town's certified arborist to look into planting these around town

Cathar, most of the your writings lacks dignity for others. I suspect that you do not have much dignity for yourself. Maybe you should work on that.

Banning trolls is equivalent to blocking spam and is consistent with the principles of free speech.

Aw, I miss the trolls. They're so cute. Little furry feet and all.

I liked playing football past high school, HidingIn...., a great deal. As I assume you enjoy wanking in lieu of a social life. I'm sure you've earned your "letter" there many times over.

Mikey, when it comes to "free speech," you're just a run-of-the-mill hypocrital boob. Were we banning posts that paid no heed to the rules of English, after all (speaking of spam), you'd never be allowed on here. What you really want is thought control; too bad your own verbal excrescences display so little connection to the thinking process.

And of course, lasercompassionatefella, one might wonder what "dignity" is contained in all those, uh, "colloquialisms" you've tossed out with such dumb fervor her in the past. Tra la la!

I thought Hobbits were the ones with the furry feet?

Or is that just lasermike?

I thought maybe Ice was a troll, but he's just a nappy-headed neocon apologist.

(There, happy now?)

Pork Roll, a bit of explication about "trolls": 2 years or so ago, a fairly vociferous (if never much verbally gifted) and rote liberal poster named "Butchcjg" claimed, in the spirit of Senator McCarthy, that there were 8 trolls, 8, I note, 8 card-carrying trolls, who ruined it for everyone else here.

The logical thing was next to press Butch for the handles of the 8. Try as I personally might, for example, I was never able to come up with more than 5 "trolls" regularly posting who espoused a clearly conservative viewpoint, and a 6th mildly liberal sort who tried his best to be all friendly things to all people. Alas, while Butch could maybe count (maybe), she remained surprisingly tight-lipped on the names of those she'd uncovered. And that's where the matter lay for a long time, although those who I'd guessed might qualify, including self, for a time proudly appended (8T) to their posting names.

I suspect mikey is simply reviving this Salem Witch Trials-like spirit with his own complaints about trolling. He's dying for adherents, for trolls of his own. Yet no one ever applies. Hence his dissatisfaction, since no one wishes to toss out "colloquialisms" like "war criminal" and "neo-Nazi" as he used to do with such stern abandon.

Anyway, that seems to be the basic genesis of the rush to claims of trollism (as opposed to the sexual practice of troilism, I suppose). I hope this helps, and perhaps others will even elaborate in this space about trolling as experienced and defined by the laserlad.

I just read that there is a film company in california that has made a porn movie called "nappy headed ho's" and a dollar from the sale of every dvd will be sent to Imus in honor of the first amendment.

Bye for now, I need to comb my feet.

Cathar, keep you personal comments to yourself. If you have some to say email me.