Wednesday, August 31, 2005

The man is just a bad President.


Taken Tuesday August 30, 2005 while New Orleans flooded. Maintaining balance, I guess.

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

The death of Windows

Hollywood, Microsoft align on new Windows | CNET News.com


For the first time, the Windows operating system will wall off some audio and video processes almost completely from users and outside programmers, in hopes of making them harder for hackers to reach. The company is establishing digital security checks that could even shut off a computer's connections to some monitors or televisions if antipiracy procedures that stop high-quality video copying aren't in place.

In short, the company is bending over backward--and investing considerable technological resources--to make sure Hollywood studios are happy with the next version of Windows, which is expected to ship on new PCs by late 2006. Microsoft believes it has to make nice with the entertainment industry if the PC is going to form the center of new digital home networks, which could allow such new features as streaming high-definition movies around the home.


Hey now you can do less with your computer!

As Cory Doctorow writes:


Microsoft is also subverting copyright. Fair use and other public rights in copyright hinge on factors that can't be modelled in software. For example, people engaged in parody have a lot more flexibility in terms of how they use copyrighted works than people who are engaged in satire. The difference between parody and satire is pretty fine -- it's the kind of thing courts rule on, not the kind of thing that you get a computer to detect.

DRM apologists claim that DRM can be used to model the preponderance of fair uses, but this is completely untrue. Fair use almost always hinges on intention -- there isn't any software that is capable of reading a user's mind and determining intention.

We'll see.

BBC NEWS | Americas | Revolution on Venezuela's estates

Did I mention that Freepers were morons?

Big Brass Blog

Monday, August 29, 2005

An Arizona daily Dumps Coulter

My opinion David Stoeffler: Opinion pages get a makeover | The Arizona Daily Star ?:

"Finally, we've decided that syndicated columnist Ann Coulter has worn out her welcome. Many readers find her shrill, bombastic and mean-spirited. And those are the words used by readers who identified themselves as conservatives."


Unfortunately they replaced her with Tony Snow.

Like you didn't see this coming.

The Raw Story | ACLU reveals FBI labeled peace, affirmative action group 'terrorist'

Hey Wingnuts! Better sick your dogs on this guy.

THE BRAD BLOG: "Mr. Bush, Specialist Young Would Also Like to Speak With You..."

Election result maps by population

Election result maps

A different take on the '04 election map.

Cenk Uygur -- Brilliant

The Blog | Cenk Uygur: The War Against Fundamentalism | The Huffington Post

"We are not fighting a war against terror. Terror is a method of warfare. Fighting against terror is kind of like fighting against rifles."


Read it.

$145,000

Experts Warn Debt May Threaten Economy - Yahoo! News

That's what you currently owe to pay our debts.

Friday, August 26, 2005

Just plain sick.

White House Briefing  News on President George W Bush and the Bush Administration:


"About 50 members of the White House press corps accepted President Bush's invitation last night to come over to his house in Crawford, eat his food, drink his booze, hang around the pool and schmooze with him -- while promising not to tell anyone what he said afterward."


Note to the press. Do you fucking job. (Hint it's not to brownnose the goddamn, whoever the fuck he is.)

Dowd on Bush's Salt Lake City speech

My Private Idaho - New York Times:

"'We owe them something,' he told veterans in Salt Lake City (even though his administration tried to shortchange the veterans agency by $1.5 billion). 'We will finish the task that they gave their lives for.'

What twisted logic: with no W.M.D., no link to 9/11 and no democracy, now we have to keep killing people and have our kids killed because so many of our kids have been killed already? Talk about a vicious circle: the killing keeps justifying itself."

Some cops in Utah probably aren't going to like this.

Boing Boing: Cops have to pay $41k for stopping man from videoing them

K9 and Sarah Jane Smith coming back to Doctor Who

Sci Fi Wire -- The News Service of the Sci Fi Channel

K9 and Sarah Jane Smith (Elisabeth Sladen) will be guesting in an ep of season 28 of Doctor Who. So will some dude from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Now a geek aside:

IT IS NOT SEASON TWO OF DOCTOR WHO. IT IS SEASON 28.

That is all.

Why doesn't this stuff happen to me?

Mercury - Man forced to have sex at gunpoint

Red states vote Bush...

So Blue states can die for him


Click to enlarge.

Just Another Stop In Gitmo America

The Rude Pundit

The Rude One takes down John "Mistakes Happen" Loftus and the "pathetic, worthless dungheaps, unable to articulate anything more than "Terrist bad" and rage at the full moon for daring to take away the shadows they cower in, piss bucket opportunists who only need to be told where to bring the mob so, hunched over and grunting, they can lynch and burn, lynch and burn, without the niceties of trial, the delays of due process, and cavort and cackle like crazed jackals over the carrion corpses of the dead."

Great as always.

Jon Stewart -- Pimp

via Wonkette:


"Stewart: The people who say we shouldn't fight in Iraq aren't saying it's our fault. . . That is the conflation that is the most disturbing. . .
Hitch: Don't you hear people saying. . .
Stewart: You hear people saying a lot of stupid [bleep]. . . But there are reasonable disagreements in this country about the way this war has been conducted, that has nothing to do with people believing we should cut and run from the terrorists, or we should show weakness in the face of terrorism, or that we believe that we have in some way brought this upon ourselves. . .
Hitch: [Sputter]
Stewart: They believe that this war is being conducted without transparency, without credibility, and without competence...
Hitch: I'm sorry, sunshine... I just watched you ridicule the president for saying he wouldn't give. . .
Stewart: No, you misunderstood why. . . . That's not why I ridiculed the president. He refuses to answer questions from adults as though we were adults and falls back upon platitudes and phrases and talking points that does a disservice to the goals that he himself shares with the very people he needs to convince.

[Audience erupts in applause]

Hitch: You want me to believe you're really secretly on the side of the Bush administration. . .
Stewart: I secretly need to believe he's on my side. He's too important and powerful a man not to be."


It's sad, but not unusual, that the best analysis of the world's events comes from a half hour comedy show. Hitch is liberal hawk Christopher Hitchens BTW.

Major League Clusterfuck

Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Police watchdog has 'crucial' Stockwell tube footage

Pat Robertson only supports killing dictators he doesn't do business with.

Pat Robertson and His Business Buddies (washingtonpost.com)

Liberian strongman Charles Taylor... He's cool, Pat's got gold mines there.

The late and brutal Zairian(?) dictator Mobutu Sese Seko... He's cool. Pat had diamond mines there.

Oh and he's got business ventures in that "great bastion of liberty, religious freedom and land of forced abortions, the People's Republic of China." It's a for profit Internets company called the Global Business Development Network.

Now I personally don't buy into the whole heaven and hell thing, but I'm pretty sure hypocrisy and lying, as Robertson did when he claimed he didn't call for Chavez's assassination two days after he did so, are pretty quick way to hell. So if I'm wrong, and I do end up in hell at least have a preacher there.

So true.

It's all about the soldiers | Needlenose:


"For better or worse, Cindy Sheehan has become a lightning-rod for right-wing/GOP criticism. By positioning themselves against her, her opponents have backed themselves into a pro-War position from which no amount of we support the troops sloganeering will offer any escape. The troops didn't go out to Iraq to die. Nobody goes out to fight a war so they can die (unless they're mental) and you don't support the troops by demanding that they stay in harm's way. "

Thursday, August 25, 2005

HotOrNot + Google Maps

HotOrNot Google Maps

Oh fun...

No people liked Bill Clinton

The Blog | Cenk Uygur: Big Media Lie -- People Like George Bush | The Huffington Post

Cenk Uygur the guy with the funny name and the good points like:

Here’s the mainstream media myth that’s driving me crazy:

Americans really like George W. Bush.

News Flash – George Bush’s approval ratings are at 36%. Those are pre-coup numbers. That’s when a politician in a third world country becomes so unpopular that a couple of generals decide to show him the door. Nixon at the height of Watergate was at 39%, three points HIGHER than Bush is right now. And people despised Nixon.

To say “people like Bush” under these circumstances is to be so inaccurate that I have to question either your intelligence or your motives. How much cognitive reasoning ability do you need to figure out that 36% approval rating means people DON’T like George Bush? Do you owe the guy money or something?

The corollary to the “Americans like Bush” myth is: Bill Clinton brought disgrace to the White House and average Americans were disgusted by his actions.

Bill Clinton approval rating when he left office was 66%! On the day of his impeachment (12/19/98), when supposedly regular Americans were disgusted by his actions, his approval rating was even higher. It was 72%.

Do you think the networks will run this ad?

Be A Witness

Of course not, it points out that there is real news happening in the world while we worry about Michael Jackson, runaway brides, and a missing white woman.

So this should keep Pat Robertson out of the UK right?*

Powers to ban extremists unveiled


Home Secretary Charles Clarke has set out a list of "unacceptable behaviour" which could see extremists deported from Britain.

Fundamentalists who engage in the activities on the list could also be prevented from entering the country.

The types of conduct to be outlawed include inflammatory preaching and publishing views fostering hatred or fomenting terrorism.


*Stolen from Sploid

They just hate science

Hispanic Business Forums - Profiling Report Leads to a Demotion By ERIC LICHTBLAU


The Bush administration is replacing the director of a small but critical branch of the Justice Department, months after he complained that senior political officials at the department were seeking to play down newly compiled data on the aggressive police treatment of black and Hispanic drivers.

The demotion of the official, Lawrence A. Greenfeld, whom President Bush named in 2001 to lead the Bureau of Justice Statistics, caps more than three years of simmering tensions over charges of political interference at the agency. And it has stirred anger and tumult among many Justice Department statisticians, who say their independence in analyzing important law enforcement data has been compromised.

Officials at the White House and the Justice Department said no political pressure had been exerted over the statistics branch. But they declined to discuss the job status of Mr. Greenfeld, who told his staff several weeks ago that he had been asked to move on after 23 years of generally high marks as a statistician and supervisor at the agency. Mr. Greenfeld, who was initially threatened with dismissal and the possible loss of some pension benefits, is expected to leave the agency soon for a lesser position at another agency.

More Hypocrisy

Whiskey Bar: Aid and Comfort

on supporting the President. This time courtesy of the American Legion. Funny how the Internets uncovers this stuff. This is another case of "Clinton wants to go to Bosnia? We're against that, but we support our troops." vs. "If you don't support Dear Leader Dubya you're unpatriotic."

Tuesday, August 23, 2005

So it's ok to call for Robertson's assassination right?

FOXNews.com - U.S. & World - Robertson Calls for Chavez's Assassination

He's certainly done more harm to this country than Chavez has.

Moron

FOXNews.com - U.S. & World - Debate Brews Over Use of Koran in Court


GREENSBORO, N.C. — Traditionally, witnesses taking the stand in court are sworn in by placing their hand on the Bible (search).

But when Muslims in Guilford County, N.C., tried to donate copies of the Koran (search) for courtroom use, judges turned them down.

Chief District Court Judge Joseph Turner (search) says taking an oath on the Koran is not allowed by North Carolina state law, which specifies that witnesses shall place their hands on the “holy scriptures,” which he interprets as the Christian Bible.


Of course, he doesn't have a legal leg to stand on, but it's sad that this guy is a judge.

It's not tragic. It's evil.

De Menezes execution - www.ezboard.com

Thursday, August 18, 2005

Apple - Mighty Mouse

Just got an Apple Mighty Mouse (multi-button Apple mouse aka fourth sign of the apocolypse) and all I can say is...

meh.

Before I had this mouse hooked up I had two different mice for my G5. I started with the standard Bluetooth one button mouse. Playing WoW with a one button is untenable so I procured a two button M$ scroll mouse. Both of those optical mice tracked on the table my Mac sits on. The Mighty Mouse doesn't. I need a mouse pad under it. Blech... so 1997.

Second the buttons... or actually lack thereof. This is a "two button mouse" but Apple outcuted themselves and the mouse appears to have only one button and a scroll doohickee (had to lookup the technical term for that one... it's not a wheel but it does scroll... it's more like the "eraser mouse" on some laptops). The trick is the surface of the mouse is touch sensitive. Click on the left hand side of the button you get a left click. Click on the right hand side of the mouse and you get a right click... in theory. The problem here is that when I mouse, I leave my pointer finger permanently on the left button and my middle and ring fingers on the right. I click the right button with my ring finger and use the middle for scrolling. Being touch sensitive with my big paw all over it the Mighty Mouse interprets my right clicks as "all button mash" which it helpfully defaults to... a left click. To get a right click I actually have to lift pointer finger off the left side of the mouse. I know that sounds a lot like George Jetson complaining about how many times he had to push the button that day, but it is incredibly annoying and after an hour of mousing I have a sore pointer from lifting it awkwardly off the mouse.

The side buttons are nice. OS X has a kick ass window manager feature called Expose. By default if you drag your mouse outside the top left corner of the screen the "All Windows" feature of Expose activates and the desktop "zooms out" and all your open windows are tiled on the screen. Left click on the one you want and it zooms (literally) to the front. It's the only app-switcher faster than "alt-tab" (ok openapple-tab) I've seen. By default the side buttons activated this feature. That's cool. What's not so cool is there are "two" side buttons, but there really aren't. There's a button on each side of the mouse, but they both do the same thing. It's one button, and there's no way to make the left side button do something different than the right.

The scroll doohickey works pretty. My complaint here is more form the function. Normally I scroll with my middle finger, but this doohickey works more like a laptop eraser mouse and I need to use my pointer finger as my middle is not dextrous enough to control the pointer. Once you actually get scrolling, it's sweet. I can see real uses for this thing for graphics people. To quote Eazy-E "I got front and back and side to side." You really can scroll around in circles, diagonally, whatevs, so for working with large images I can see some potential for this scroller. Now if they'd just put it in a better mouse.

So the final verdict is ick. Cool scroll thingee and it nice to have Expose available from anywhere on the screen, but go get a $29 M$ five button jobby for your Mac if you need a multi-button mouse (and you do).

Daily Kos: Ahh, the good ol' days

Daily Kos: Ahh, the good ol' days

"You can support the troops but not the president."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
--Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
--Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"[The] President . . . is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
--Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy."
--Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning . . I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."
--Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"
--Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
--Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)


Republicans on committing troops to Bosnia in the '90's. Zero US troops died in combat in Bosnia.

Tuesday, August 16, 2005

If Fox News had covered Rosa Parks

The Huffington Post -- Cenk Uygur


Cindy Sheehan – in case you’ve been living in a box or you only watch the mainstream media – is the mom of slain Iraq War veteran Casey Sheehan. She is protesting in front of George Bush’s Crawford ranch this month. This grieving mom has been characterized as a flip-flopper, accused of putting on a public circus, lambasted as a publicity seeking grandstander and criticized for not truly speaking for her family since an aunt and a godmother Matt Drudge found somewhere in the Sheehan family disagrees with her. The conservative attack machine is in high gear in the efforts to tear this woman down.

That made me think of how it would have been in the Civil Rights era if Fox News Channel, Rush Limbaugh, Matt Drudge and the rest of the gang were around back then.

O’Reilly: “Rosa Parks claims she speaks for all of the African-Americans in the South, but in fact, we have found two African-Americans who say they disagree with her. They say she’s just trying to gain publicity and doesn’t speak for anyone in her race. They would know, they’re black.”

Hannity: “Could Rosa Parks be angling for a Senate run? What does she have to gain from her public stand? Coming up next, the incredible story of how this woman might be deceiving the whole country!”

10.8 Million???

Newsday.com: Report: Crowe reaches phone-hurling settlement

Remember when Russell Crowe threw a phone at that hotel clerk a while back? "Sources" say he's dropping 10.8 Million on the problem to make it go away.

Russell -- next time you need to throw a phone at somebody I'm available for 1% of that amount... a mere 108K to bounce a phone off my noggin. I'll knock it down to 50K if you say, "May I trouble you for the salt?" afterward.

Monday, August 15, 2005

Why America must be destroyed*

New York Daily News - Daily Dish & Gossip - Rush & Molloy: For Trump, tacky is Koz for concern:

"Some of Jessica Simpson's fans weren't content with an autograph when they saw the 'Dukes of Hazzard' star walking down Rodeo Drive in Beverly Hills on Wednesday. Her more rabid admirers actually began ripping pieces of her clothing, our spy reports.
As paparazzi snapped, Simpson began pounding on the door of Valentino's boutique, seeking sanctuary.
'Let me in, let me in!' she pleaded.
Store security kept the lensmen at bay. Simpson showed her gratitude by spending nearly $15,000 on a gray cable-knit sweater with a faux-fur collar and two bags."


*Because there are people in America who can shop at a store where two bags and a sweater cost $15K, and I know school teachers who are on food stamps.

The NCAA is staffed by morons

Hit and Run


A group of Georgia football fans took up a collection to pay for a Boise State player's father to fly from Baghdad to see his son play against the Bulldogs in Athens.

But the NCAA rule book got in the way.


You read that right. Georgia fans wanted to fly a dad from Iraq to Georgia to root /against/ Georgia and for his son. The NCAA said, "No dice."

Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Mark Simonson on Typography in the Movies

Typecasting

Simonson grades movies based on their realistic use of fonts. e.g. Why did they use a font created in 1978 for a flier in a movie set in the 50's?

Google China... Warez central

Finding warez using Google | The days start here

Tuesday, August 09, 2005

Wow.

Matthew Shepard Online Resources - Religious Right Hate Speech - Nazi Propaganda
vs. Religious Right Anti-gay Rhetoric


Go check that out and see how very very similar the wingnuts rhetoric on gays is Hitler's on Jews.

Friday, August 05, 2005

Thursday, August 04, 2005

Chadfox meets Ms. Russell

stop touching my food.: jane russell trumps charo any day

Cool things happen to Chadfox.

Casemods Will Not Get You Laid

Motorcycle Case Mod : Gizmodo:

"Dear Friends: Do not think that by creating a case mod that looks like a bike and writing Computer Bike (click link for pic) on the side and then draping your couch with gray fabric will a woman come and sit by you or want to have anything to do with you. The image you see above%u2014of a lovely lady lying next to a case mod so dork-tastic that it kind of goes all the way around the concept of dorkiness and comes out on the other side%u2014was staged by a computer magazine with a huge modeling budget. They%u2019re trying to fool you into think that you will get girls with case mods. This is false. Instead, you will get the satisfaction of building a case mod and then you will look back on the years between your sixteenth and twenty-fifth birthday and wonder why you didn%u2019t get laid more. It happened to me and it happened to everybody at ExtremeTech. Don%u2019t let it happen to you."

Cool view of the newspapers

Today's Front Pages - Map View

Flash app the displays the current front pages for 460 newspapers from 45 countries.

Tuesday, August 02, 2005

"Staff Puke"

Daily Kos: OH-02: Limbaugh calls names:

What Rush Limbaugh just called Paul Hackett, Iraq veteran running for Congress from. Support the troops... unless they don't agree with you politically. Then you have to attack their service record. Typical dopehead type move.

I'm glad you lost your hearing Rush... now if you would just lose your voice... and your anal virginity to a guy named Bubba in the Big House.

Man Dog doesn't like the Declaration of Independence?

Santorum: the pursuit of Happiness harms America - (via) Santorum Exposed: The Blog:


"'It is an entire culture that focus (sic) on immediate gratification and the pursuit of happiness and personal pleasure. And it is harming America.'"
--Rick Man Dog Santorum



We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.
--Thomas Jefferson et al

Supposedly via a Phish msg board

(via) stereogum: Rolly Polly Phishheads:

"I must say folks last night was the most intense night of my life. I was released from the hospital this morning, the doctor said i was lucky to be alive. With furthur tests i might have suffered slight brain damage, the doctors are at this moment unsure.
Yesterday me and a few buddies decided to drop acid, and during our trip we decide to smoke bowls. We were having a great time up until my friend said 'hey i heard on a phish board that if you put gasoline in the bong it will get you way faded.' So being the stupid ass stonner that i am, i decided to indulge. We went to the local Chevron and put in $1 of premuium with techron into my 3 foot roor. I took the first hit. At first i felt really dizzy, i started vomiting, and then i passed out. That night i woke up in the hospital with the worst headache i have ever had. Needless to say i am luck to be alive.

I must warn everyone to never try anything like this again. I realize i have a slight drug problem and i am now enrolled in a treatment center. If i can give anyone advice it would be to never try anything that is out of the ordinary, no strage drug combos. BE SAFE OUT THERE PEOPLE!"

Multi-button Apple Mouse!

The Apple Store (U.S.)

You oughta filter that George.

Bush: Intelligent Design Should Be Taught


You're asking me whether or not people ought to be exposed to different ideas, the answer is yes
--Dubya 08/01/2005



I glance at the headlines, just to get kind of a flavor. I rarely read the stories.
--Dubya 10/03

Juan Cole on "media bias" in Iraq.

Informed Comment :

"Let me just suggest that if bombs were going off in Republican neighborhoods in the United States, the local mayor couldn't mollify the Republicans by saying, 'But we painted the school! "