Oh geez. The NFL has brought back those excruciatingly bad Don Cheadle "Playoffs" commercials. Of all the people to lose their job over the last couple of years, sadly the persons who thought of these ads and approved weren't among them.
Posted by rodya at 1:48pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Sports
I just got Saddam capture themed spam...
Posted by rodya at 9:52am | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
"We got him."
U.S. forces have captured Saddam Hussein in a late night raid near his hometown of Tikrit, according to the head of the Coalition Provisional Authority.
"Ladies and gentleman, we got him," L. Paul Bremer announced Sunday. The announcement was greeted with cheers from the audience.
[...]
Several Iraqi journalists stood up and shouted "Death to Saddam" after the video was shown.
Of course, in the obsession with balance, the article has to end with the information that 16 Iraqis were killed in a completely unrelated attack. Nice to end an article of such importance with bad news. Idiots. Yeah, we need to know that stuff too, but put it in a different article.
But for today, I will let that pass and celebrate the capture of the "longtime Iraqi leader", as this CNN dispatch insists on calling him. I won't worry about how the French and the Germans will be pissed that they won't be allowed to bid on his fate or that human rights groups will show more concern for his condition than they have for any in the mass graves or how Christianne Amanpour will tut-tut that bin Laden is still at large as if that negates everything or that the second headline on the
New York Times' site is "U.S. Sees More Attacks Despite Hussein's Capture". The fucker has been caught, and no amount of media hissy can dilute that today.
Posted by rodya at 7:51am | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
It's getting closer and closer to time to rename the Heisman Trophy to the Mediocre Big School White Quarterback Award.
Posted by rodya at 8:51pm | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Sports
Airports suck as it is. Now the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, and doesn't that sound like a fun group to party with, wants to encourage it to be worse.
But a survey of the 15 busiest airports by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine found it is getting easier for travelers to find meals that are low in fat and cholesterol and high in fiber, though not in every city.
[...]
The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine is a Washington-based organization that promotes preventive health through better nutrition.
"Passengers have enough to worry about before boarding a plane. They don't need the added fear of skyrocketing cholesterol levels," Turner-McGrievy said.
Look, Airport food needs to be one of two things, preferably both: binding and alcoholic. There should be one restaurant, Lord Rictus' House of Cheese and Whiskey, and that's it.
Posted by rodya at 4:28pm | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Ban the Fridge!
A huge increase in the incidence of Crohn's disease, a debilitating condition of the digestive system, is directly related to the availability of refrigerators, new research suggests.
Our modern world leads to nothing but death and decay. I'm off to read a poem about pain.
Posted by rodya at 2:21pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
One of my great pet peeves is the sound of people eating noisily. One can politely bring this up as many times as you want, but, sadly, one cannot break someone's lifetime habit just for one's own over-sensibilities. The guy in the cube next to me spends all day munching loudly on chips (mouth open rapid chewing, rattling bag, the whole bit). Sometimes it's an apple. The funny thing is, he's rail thin. I don't know how a guy can eat Fritos all day and be like that. Then again, I've overheard conversations he has with his wife. It's entirely possible he's not allowed to eat at home.
Yesterday, after munching and chewing and chewing and munching for about 20 minutes, he swallowed wrong and began to cough and choke. It was a blessed change. Sadly, he cleared the obstruction and went back to his snack.
This pointless bitching has been brought to you by finally getting something to work.
Posted by rodya at 1:50pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Posts I Want To Delete
Hey, first jackhole to try to find a "formmail" script on this site can be found at IP 195.229.241.228. Posting the IP actually does no good, but it feels good. Plus it's just another IP to add to the "drop all" list.
Posted by rodya at 12:42pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
The Kennedy conspiracy grows.
A man apparently shot himself to death early Friday on the "X" in Dealey Plaza that marks the spot where President John F. Kennedy was assassinated 40 years ago, authorities said.
Nothing like a showy suicide to finally get that attention you've been wanting.
Posted by rodya at 12:31pm | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Strange the things we weren't supposed to know.
The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog said in an interview published Friday that he believes Israel has nuclear weapons and suggested Israel rid itself of the stockpile to promote Mideast peace.
I thought it was a well established and known fact that Israel had nukes. I guess it never has been official.
"As I go around the Middle East there is a sensation of frustration and impotence. People say there is an asymmetrical situation and a situation that is not sustainable and that we cannot go on like this, and I agree."
Yes. All the tension and ill will in the Mideast is due to Israel having nukes. If they'd just dump them, it would turn that regional frown upside down. Iran would stop seeking nukes. Terrorists would stop seeking nukes. All humanity would raise their voices to sing a wondrous chord of peace and togetherness whose musical vibrations would cause all greenhouse gasses to dissipate.
Posted by rodya at 11:25am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
It is wrong to judge other cultures.
A judge has ruled that a Pakistani man convicted of attacking his 17-year-old fiancee with acid be blinded with acid himself, police said Friday.
Mohammed Sajid, 19, poured acid on the face of his fiancee Rabia Bibi on June 24 in Bahawalpur, a city in the eastern Pakistani province of Punjab. His two brothers were also convicted of taking part.
[...]
The judge ordered that a doctor perform the punishment publicly at a sports stadium.
"This is an Islamic way of doing justice," the judge wrote in his verdict.
Any comment on my part would be insensitive.
Posted by rodya at 9:55am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Paging Troy McClure*:
"FDA advisers urge more explicit fish advice"
Uh...
*Here's to Phil
Posted by rodya at 8:43am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Oh frapturous day! Artists are here to spark conversation! Well, not here. They're in Trafalgar Square. But since we are all one in the solidarity of humanity (at least that's what I gathered from ugly people getting naked by the masses), the use of "here" before can and will be defended! Don't you try to crush my dissent against making sense!
six statues that included a model of a naked, disabled pregnant woman and a pair of wooden Tomahawk cruise missiles.
[...]
"I like the protesters sculpture," said Eileen Spiteri, 75, of London, gesturing at Sokari Douglas Camp's submission, a group of anti-war demonstrators waving placards.
Camp says her roughly welded stainless steel work refers to the recent demonstrations against the U.S. led-invasion of Iraq, which have all ended in Trafalgar Square.
Woah, that piece is, like, making a statement about people making a statement.
Stefan Gec's Tomahawk missiles piece makes a statement about war and plays on its setting in Trafalgar Square, named after the site of Adm. Horatio Nelson's famous victory over the French in 1805. Gec, who calls his sculpture "Mannequin," said it "explores the concept of victory and its commemoration in the 21st century."
The missiles are made from wood from the same forests that supplied timber for Nelson's war galleys.
Ok....
Marc Quinn's sculpture of a pregnant disabled woman, "Alison Lapper Pregnant," is a portrait of a friend. The model's arms are missing and her legs are stunted but her voluptuous body is overwhelmingly feminine and her gaze is proud and alert.
"Alison's statue could represent a new model of female heroism," Quinn said.
He's bold in the face of your middle class comfort Q-zone. Some don't agree.
"I understand what the artist is trying to do," said Gardiner, the onlooker. "But it's not aesthetic, it's not what I'd like to look at most."
Get over your hang-ups, honey!
Chris Burden, a California-based artist, has made a model of two skyscrapers built from a metal girder construction set. Although each tower resembles New York's Empire State Building, they also are instant reminders of the World Trade Center.
"It will spark conversation about all structural, economic, safety and aesthetic issues involved in building structures that push towards the heavens," Burden said.
WTC based art is the new lazy man's art, I guess. It used to be twisted ikonography for your built in attention getter, but nothing lasts forever.
Don't worry if you do not get chosen, you brave souls of our spirit. As Bill Cosby once said, just put two grooves in it and you've got yourself a nice functional ashtray.
Posted by rodya at 8:41am | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Ok, so the structure we have now after the Supreme court decision is one in which organizations such as MoveOn and such will hold all the money and more or less shape all campaigns for candidates and parties since the candidate and parties no longer are allowed access to as much money. This means candidates will even more than before have to meet the terms of these groups in order to get elected since these groups now know they control a significant portion of the money spent on campaigning. So these new regulations have freed us from special interests how?
The extension of the Supreme Court decision, which, in effect, said that Congress has the power to regulate political speech as it pleases as long as it uses the excuse of trying to make it more conducive to the process, is that in a few years expect to see a fight that no campaign speech will be allowed from privately funded sources. The only political speech that will be allowed will be that which is publicly funded. Yes, I see that as being the end goal. Whether they get there or not is unknown.
Posted by rodya at 8:30am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
ABC. Crushing dissent.
ABC News says it will stop having producers travel full time with the presidential campaigns of Carol Moseley Braun, Dennis Kucinich and Al Sharpton.
The network says it's a routine coverage decision, but it has angered Braun and Kucinich -- particularly after the Ohio congressman had a testy exchange with ABC News' Ted Koppel during Tuesday's debate in New Hampshire.
Don't fuck with Koppel, man.
Posted by rodya at 8:07am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Woo! The boss is out. Well, one of them at least. Still gives me a little more leeway during the day. So....any requests?
Posted by rodya at 7:56am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
The recommended plan in France to ban all conspicuous religious garb has backlash and unintended consequences written all over it.
A report delivered to President Jacques Chirac on Thursday called for a new law banning the wearing of "conspicuous" religious symbols in French public schools — large crosses for Christians, head scarves for Muslim girls, or skullcaps for Jewish boys.
[...]
That principle, the report said, would be guaranteed by impartiality and the banning of all conspicuous religious symbols in official institutions, but individuals using those institutions would not be barred from wearing "discreet symbols like, for example, medallions, small crosses, Stars of David, hands of Fatima, or small Korans."
To me, it looks like they are taking a severe problem of bigotry and unassimilated racism and attacking the superficials rather than (dare I say it? I do!) the root causes which are the bigotry and the unassimilated strife. At least this way makes it easier and easier for them to pretend the problems don't exist.
Posted by rodya at 7:21am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Wesley "Vote For Me Because I'm Wesley Clark" Clark has all sorts of great domestic goals. No plans, but some nice and not in the least contradictory to achieve goals.
He said he would fulfill five goals if elected: increasing the average family income by $3,000; cleaning up the environment; lowering college tuition and increasing college enrollment by a million students; elevating two million children out of poverty; and guaranteeing health care for every child and accessibility to health care for all Americans.
Unfortunately for Gen. Clark, it's the "White House", not a Gum Drop House. And it's on Pennsylvania Ave., not Lollipop Lane.
Posted by rodya at 4:50pm | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Note to self, avoid Christmas in New Zealand.
Parliament has rushed through a controversial law aimed at preventing drunken disorder on the streets over the festive season.
The bill was supposed to ban people from consuming or carrying alcohol in designated areas or face a $206 (NZ $500) fine.
But a mistake in the wording means the ban could cover any public area in the country.
"An alcohol ban that was introduced for a few discreet places now covers every park, every beach, every road and footpath," said opposition National Party MP Nick Smith.
"It will be practically impossible to purchase alcohol without breaking this law."
Eep. Oh well, at least one person in New Zealand will escape from lack of evidence.
At least one drinker is going to get a shock over Christmas though. Instead of uncorking a $62 (NZ $150) vintage Hawke's Bay red, the drinker will find a bottle of coloured water, the New Zealand Herald reported on Thursday.
The mistake happened last week when winery staff in the town of Hastings accidentally sold a display bottle labelled Gimblett Road 1998 Cabernet Sauvignon-Merlot.
He's going to think he's been attacked by a Reverse-Jesus!
Posted by rodya at 1:52pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
"Money is the root of all evil" is probably the favorite Biblical quote of those who don't give a damn about Biblical quotes. Now we can add that money is the excuse for all folly. The corrupting influence of money was the primary reason given for why we needed to limit speech surrounding elections. The corrupting force of money was used as the excuse for why the government felt it had to ban speech merely because it was not the kind of speech the government thought was conducive. The Supreme Court accepted the argument that since issue ads were unpleasant to candidates, the government would no longer protect the right of citizens to exercise their rights in this way.
And that is how it has to be phrased. I didn't lose any rights yesterday. No one can rob me of my right to free speech. The state can only restrict my ability to exercise this right. It is not lost to me, but it has been suppressed. While certain aspects of free speech are no longer my "Constitutional Rights", I will always claim them as my inalienable rights.
But back to the quote with which this started. Though that is the most common way it is said, it is a misquote. The actual passage is "The love of money is the root of all evil." There is a very important distinction between the two. The former phrasing makes money the corrupting influence. It is an external force which causes corruption. The later phrasing makes the corruption from within. It is the individual's love of money which causes them to make corrupt choices.
It is the difference between these two approaches that has brought us where we are today. Sen. Feingold was on NPR with Nina Totenberg* yesterday first of all declaring that his next goal is full public funding of campaigns. But on the very reason for the new campaign finance regulations, he said he had to do it because he saw a Congress completely corrupted by campaign cash. He never did once name an instance of this corruption, nor any member of Congress whose performance was corrupted. During debate, members of Congress went on and on about the corruption. Ok, then why didn't any of them resign if they were so horrified at all the corruption? If the whole of Congress was corrupted, where are the trials? If things were so bad that they would attempt to restrict our rights, where are the investigations into all this corruption?
But that's the thing. They do not say that they are corrupt. They say they have been corrupted. It is not their choices to accept money or to maybe vote a certain way purely because of a campaign gift; it's the system that forced certain things upon them. They were merely passives washed along in all this cash. Victims of the system, as it were. Truly if they are collectively so spineless, instead offloading any moral responsibility to some external system, then none of them should be there.
*One of her examples of the evils of the old system was a group founded by pharmaceutical companies using one of those names like Citizens For Medicare Happiness. She claimed big business does this in order to hide who they are. She failed to mention that corporations had to create these screen organizations because current law forbade them from running such campaigns directly. She ignored that allowing corporations to directly do such things would be the most transparent and informative to the electorate.
Posted by rodya at 1:36pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Posts I Want To Delete
As much as I must detest Sen. McCain (R - Where The First Amendment Ain't For You)'s now fully successful efforts to alienate from me certain of my inalienable rights, with the shameful and willing help of the President and the whole of government, I still have to agree with him when I think he's right.
"I think the conditions are adequate [in Guantanamo], in some cases more than adequate. But my concern is the disposition of the prisoners," McCain told The Associated Press.
"The bureaucratic process has been unnecessarily slow," said McCain, who was a prisoner of war for nearly six years in Vietnam. "These cases have to be disposed of one way or another. After keeping someone two years, a decision should be made."
It needs to get moving. Oh, in related news.
Sweden, which has one citizen at Guantanamo, announced Wednesday it will seek to host an international seminar in the coming months on whether the United States is violating international law by keeping prisoners without charge.
Since the result of that is obviously already decided, they could save a lot of time by just saying now that is what they think. But that would rob a lot of media and others a bitchin' good anti-American time in Sweden.
Posted by rodya at 1:02pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
From the Inverse Compliment Department:
Former President Jimmy Carter says the appointment of Georgia's Zell Miller to the Senate was a mistake because his fellow ex-governor "betrayed all the basic principles that I thought he and I and others shared."
[...]
When Colmes asked Carter about Miller, the former president initially said, "I would rather not even comment about Zell Miller on the radio," then proceeded to call the appointment "one of the worst mistakes" then-Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes made in his final four years in office.
"He has really betrayed all the basic principles that I thought he and I and others shared," Carter said.
With Carter it's hard to tell who those "others" are. Consider especially that he's harsher on Zell Miller than he has ever been with Arafat or Castro or any number of terrorists and tyrants he's so chummy with.
Posted by rodya at 12:53pm | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
This is starting to become a trend.
An irate Filipino housewife sliced off her husband's penis while he slept after she discovered text messages from another woman on his mobile phone.
[...]
Doctors were able to restore his manhood after she raced home to collect the missing piece. The man, a welder, told the radio station he had forgiven his wife.
Forgiveness from fear, I'd think.
Posted by rodya at 9:21am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | ALG
A happy 85th birthday to Alexander Solzhenitsyn.
Posted by rodya at 9:01am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Now that Andy Pettitte is no longer a Yankee, I wonder if the "best pickoff move in baseball" will suddenly become the balk it has always been.
Posted by rodya at 8:38am | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Sports
Well this story about the IRS' attempts to modernize its computing just filled me with cheer.
The I.R.S. went four decades with the same system because two previous modernization attempts, the most recent in the mid-1990's, failed, costing taxpayers $4 billion.
That phrasing, at least out of context, is a bit misleading. The IRS is still using that four decade old COBOL and Assembler based system because all replacement attempts have failed or are severely delayed.
Keep close track of your records. Once a new system is someday turned up, by the very nature of these things some data will be lost or misplaced or what have you. It's going to be ugly.
Posted by rodya at 8:34am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
If my only motivation was suicide, I could think of a lot easier and better ways to do it than this.
A car parked near a synagogue in the central Italian city of Modena blew up early Thursday, killing the driver, officials said.
The dead man was believed to be a Jordanian, the Italian news agency ANSA said.
The news agency said investigators were inclined to believe it was a suicide and not an attack on the synagogue.
But I suppose it's possible since the report makes it sound like he was just near the synagogue and not close enough to really be an attack.
There have been several recent anti-Semitic incidents in Italy, which has a Jewish community of some 30,000 people, such as slogans scrawled on walls. But they have not been on the level of France, where schools and synagogues have been attacked in the past two years.
What's with the French bashing?
Posted by rodya at 8:23am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
I love this gloss over by the New York Times in discussing Arafat's once again attempt to trick people into thinking he's a statesman interested in peace.
Although Mr. Arafat was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with Israeli leaders in 1994 for the Oslo accords, Israelis have now overwhelmingly dismissed him as a potential partner for negotiations.
The assumption is that since he got a Peace Prize, that automatically makes all his motivations and actions dedicated to peace. The facts that he has done pretty much nothing except hold one hinky election, refused to hold more despite many cute promises, and done nothing to stop terrorism whether because he is unable, unwilling or both are to be ignored because the dear man won a Peace Prize.
Posted by rodya at 8:12am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
It's a bad day to be a prosecuter in a high profile terror case. First in Detroit, the Justice Department admitted it may have wrongly witheld information from the defense.
The Bush administration's first major post-Sept. 11 prosecution, which broke up a terrorist cell in Detroit, is in danger of unraveling after the Justice Department divulged it had failed to turn over evidence that might have helped the defense.
The evidence includes a letter from an imprisoned drug gang leader who alleges the government's key witness confided he made up some of his story.
Whether or not that evidence would have made a difference doesn't matter too much. This is one of those procedural fuck-ups that technicalities live on.
In Germany, investigators are now saying a suspected helper of the Hamburg al-Qaida cell that did the September 11th attacks wasn't actually involved.
A German court on Thursday ordered a Moroccan accused of supporting the Sept. 11 al-Qaida cell in Hamburg freed from custody based on new evidence that only the three Hamburg-based suicide hijackers and their purported al-Qaida liaison were involved in the plot.
[...]
The decision came after the Federal Criminal Office, Germany's equivalent of the FBI, submitted new evidence that it received Nov. 30 suggesting that Mzoudi was not involved in the plot.
Here is hoping sloppiness and a rush to get people aren't setting the guilty free and putting the patsies away.
Posted by rodya at 7:47am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
There was a power problem at the hosting center. For the two of you who tried to stop by, sorry the site was down.
Posted by rodya at 4:33pm | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Truly "Reply All" is one of the worst inventions of our age.
Posted by rodya at 10:48am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Attention panicked people. Return to your homes or places of business or whatever the hell it is you do to pass the time during the bright hours.
Nicole Kidman is not getting married to rocker Lenny Kravitz.
Oh thank God. The
horror has been averted.
Posted by rodya at 10:10am | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Citizens of the US, do not worry about today's Supreme Court decision deeming free speech too dangerous for democracy.
The court was divided on the complex issue; five of the nine justices voted to substantially uphold the soft money ban and the ad restrictions, which were the most significant features of the vast new law.
The media, the self-designated spokesmen of the people, will handle all your queries and speech for you. After all, media speech is more important than yours. Plus they know
what questions to ask better than you ever would. Besides, we all know that first amendment thing was written for the press, not you. Well, unless you want to say Bush = Hitler. That's covered too.
Sheesh. Congrats, incumbents. Your jobs are even more secure. Plus you no longer have to worry about your feelings being hurt by those nasty ads. The happy result is that candidates now must spend
more time raising money than before, so must pander even more. Give it two years before this "fix" causes the whole system to be declared broken. Then the clambering for fully tax-funded campaigns will start going hardcore.
Yes, I'm speaking too soon and should wait for the complete details to come out.
UPDATE: Having read through the dissents, it's basically come to this. The Supreme Court has declared that the free-will pooling of money to advocate an agreed upon position or candidate who supports that issue is not a right. It is not free speech. It is merely a privilege granted or withdrawn at the government's whim. That is, of course, unless you have pooled your money together to form a media corporation. At least for now. They say money is not speech, but it is the primary means of speech whose regulation here is a
de facto regulation of speech.
While many may not see much that is onerous in the new campaign finance regulations, that is no longer the issue. Today the government was granted new powers to suppress speech when and how it wants to all with the excuse of ending corruption they can't name any specific instances of or that it's just not nice political talk. Even worse for you populists out there, this decision, beyond strengthening the position of incumbents, has greatly strengthened the voice of the personally wealthy.
UPDATE II: I freely admit my analysis may be wrong on some points, but this has pissed me off.
LAST UPDATE: I'm not interested in lame "slippery slope" or slowly boiled frog arguments. I don't care if the state will or won't ever exercise this power. The simple fact is there are and powers the state should not have, no matter the odds of it using them or not.
Posted by rodya at 9:38am | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Brazil will be the next place to watch about the effectiveness of gun control.
Brazil's Senate has passed a bill to outlaw the carrying of guns in public and control illegal gun ownership.
The law will tighten rules on gun permits and create a national firearms register, with strict penalties for owning an unregistered gun.
[...]
About 40,000 people are shot dead each year in Brazil, mainly in urban shanty towns, giving the country one of the worst murder rates in the world.
That is a horrific number, though with all shooting numbers I'm a bit skeptical. Most times they lump suicides and murders in the same statistical gravy, but I'll concede here that these are all homicides. Will this actually reduce crime, or will it leave those trapped in the shanty towns undefended and at the mercy of criminals who have no problem ignoring gun laws? I fear the latter, though I understand the desire to see something done.
Posted by rodya at 9:30am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
For a couple years now, I've jokingly referred to the Nobel prizes as the Western Self Hatred Awards. While I've never read anything by JM Coetzee, winner of this year's Nobel prize for literature, the description given by the Nobel people of what was admirable about his writing makes that less of a joke.
The Swedish Academy praised his literary critiques of Western society.
It described him as "a scrupulous doubter, ruthless in his criticism of the cruel rationalism and cosmetic morality of Western civilization".
I guess Western civilization truly does deserve to be terroristed to dust.
Posted by rodya at 9:21am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Awww....the new anti-spam bill is so cute.
[T]he "can spam" legislation that Congress approved Monday requires unsolicited e-mails to include a mechanism so recipients could indicate they did not want future mass mailings. Computer users are being asked to ignore years of anti-spam training.
Spammers, especially those who operate outside the US, will get right on that.
The legislation also will prohibit senders of unsolicited commercial e-mail from disguising their identity by using a false return address or misleading subject line, and it will prohibit senders from harvesting addresses off Web sites.
It must have felt really good to vote for this bill. It better have, because that good feeling is about the only thing this law will produce.
Posted by rodya at 9:09am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
I really wish this article had more detail.
Most federal government agencies have failed to adequately protect their computer networks from hackers and other online threats, the fourth year in a row that the government has earned low marks on a computer security report card issued by a congressional oversight committee.
The Department of Homeland Security -- the government's lead agency on matters of Internet security -- was one of seven agencies that received an F grade for 2003.
Also receiving an F was the Justice Department
Details such as are databases containing sensitive information some of those things not properly secured? Oh well. At least one of those departments has the word "Security" in its title, so I'm sure they'll get those issues fixed right away. I'd hate for a government department or program to have a misleading title. I sleep poorly as it is.
Posted by rodya at 8:50am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
I have sympathy for this woman. She is a single parent with her only child serving in Iraq right now. From my observations, the relationship many single parents have with their children is a hybrid of child/parent and partner. The story points out that her son spent time in an alternative high school. In other words, beyond everything else, she went through some really tough times in the rearing of her son. It is understandable that she is scared and upset that he is in harm's way. This is especially true since she has a default anti-war stance that clouds her ability to think reasonably about any war so that she embraces fictions instead.
The mom is on the streets of the Puget Sound region, carrying signs that read, "Iraqi oil is not worth my son's blood" and "Love our troops. Hate the war."
That anyone still goes on that the war is all about OOOOOIIIIILLLLL!!!!!! shows that they haven't paid the least bit of attention, instead depending on assumed truths that require no proof. It's even scarier than that. Bush has decided to try to reinvent the whole Middle East in true democratic forms. Her anti-war stance is, of course, stamped from Vietnam.
Her attitudes on war were shaped in high school, when she thumbed through a Life magazine and opened to a spread on the My Lai massacre in Vietnam.
"I couldn't believe anything like that could happen, couldn't believe the horror. It was shocking to me," she says.
I'm amazed at how many people seem to believe that brutality started with the Vietnam war. Yet I still have sympathy for her, especially when I read the idiotic things others who oppose her have said.
For her on-the-streets stance, she has been yelled at, told to "Get a job," and branded a "traitor."
Vicky says that when she told one angry grandmother she hoped her grandson stationed in Iraq would get home safely, the woman responded, "Well, I hope your son dies!"
Some may doubt those tales, but I don't. Jerks abound on either side. What I don't have sympathy for is bad writing (which is why I have no sympathy for my own site).
The single mom didn't intend to become a letter-writing, sign-waving activist. But when the drumbeats of war started up late last year, and she realized her only child might be sent to fight, she said she was moved to action.
ARGH! Those damned "drumbeats". Seriously, what writer can use that term and not see the tired, awfulness of the cliché? It was overused decades ago even before it was stomped to dust earlier this year.
Back to the main story, the son seems to say all the right things.
"He says, 'Mom, you just keep speaking out, and I'll keep protecting your First Amendment rights to do so,' " she says.
[...]
"I told him Bush needs to turn over the rebuilding of Iraq to the U.N., and he said, 'Mom, the U.N. can't do anything right.'"
God bless 'im. One thing his mother and I definitely agree on is that he come home safe soon.
Posted by rodya at 8:00am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
How 'bout a little puppy propaganda to end the day.
Buster, a 6-year-old Springer spaniel, earned more than a pat on the head Tuesday when he was awarded Britain's highest animal bravery medal for his role in breaking a resistance cell in Iraq.
The British army canine received the Dickin Medal at a ceremony at London's Imperial Museum for discovering a cache of weapons and explosives in Safwan, southern Iraq, in March.
Good boy.
Posted by rodya at 6:30pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
When China got the 2008 Olympics, my first thought was about Taiwan. I believe the Chinese government wants the Taiwan situation settled long before then, whatever that may mean. Any moves towards independence are embarrassing and distracting, something the Chinese government most certainly does not want hanging over its Olympics. At best, things as they are now must last the decade. In my opinion that is why the stronger than I would have liked language was used by the President today, as well as many uses of the term "status quo".
But the real reason for this post is that reporters are stupid. In questioning the press secretary, some reporter said, and I paraphrase, but have not changed the tone, how can the President excuse being so selective after, and this is a direct quote, "coming out against democracy today?"
Dumbass. He didn't come out against democracy in Taiwan. He came out strongly for the status quo which is not indepdendence. The state of Missouri is a thriving if often corrupt democracy. It is not independent despite the name of its capitol.
But now, thanks to that misunderstanding dumbass, it is out there that the President had to answer charges that he is against democracy in Taiwan. It's a classic, "When did you stop beating your wife?" style situation.
Posted by rodya at 5:31pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
The gentle touch of the ATF coming to an RIAA investigation near you.
The director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is leaving his post next month to lead the recording industry's efforts to stop music piracy.
Bradley A. Buckles, who served ATF for 30 years and was named director in 1999, will come head of the Anti-Piracy Unit of the Recording Industry Association of America, the trade group announced Tuesday.
Wonder if part of this will be to use his influence to get those "Allow the industry or government random access to private computers just, you know, to check. Nothing else." laws. Either way, some doors were kicked down in celebration today.
Posted by rodya at 2:36pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Well ain't I all smiles and sunshine today.
Posted by rodya at 1:31pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
This depressing story about the difficulties governments present in treatment of malaria ignores one thing. It only talks about treatment, and the tragedies that accrue after one has the disease. Not once is it mentioned that there is an inexpensive, easy to use, not proven to cause any real damage to humans chemical that could prevent most of these cases. But rich, Western nations have worked to keep it away from these people. What slight risks to some wildlife cannot compare to the human disaster the world wide ban on DDT has caused.
Posted by rodya at 1:26pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
You know what I like best about my job? That constant sense of failure because nothing ever works. Really perks up those spirits.
Posted by rodya at 12:49pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Posts I Want To Delete
Related to this post, here is the site that breaks Weblogs.com's XML feed.
http://www.livejournal.com/users/talaitha/
Posted by rodya at 12:15pm | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
HOO DAMN! There's a high speed chase in Texas, and FoxNews has got it on the air!
Man, I can't wait until we get an embedded reporter program going for these things.
Posted by rodya at 11:38am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
What new shocks will this crazy world provide?
Zimbabwe’s main state controlled newspaper today urged President Robert Mugabe to sever diplomatic ties with Britain and Australia after the troubled southern African country pulled out of the Commonwealth.
[...]
Mugabe responded by quitting the Commonwealth.
So state controlled media encouraged state to do what it was going to do, and the state did it. Amazing.
Posted by rodya at 10:38am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
North Korea has issued its terms for halting its nuclear program.
...North Korea proposed freezing its nuclear activities in exchange for "measures such as the U.S. de-listing the DPRK as a 'terrorism sponsor,' lift of the political, economic and military sanctions and blockade and energy aid including the supply of heavy fuel oil and electricity by the U.S. and neighboring countries," the spokesman was quoted as saying by North Korea's official news agency, KCNA.
No mention of a giant statue of a kitchen sink, but that's just assumed.
"What is clear is that in no case the DPRK would freeze its nuclear activities unless it is rewarded."
At least they flat out admit that this is blackmail.
Posted by rodya at 9:57am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
This sounds really cool and ambitious. This is the sort of state funded exploration I have little trouble being taxed for.
The Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter, or Jimo, would spend monthlong stints circling the moons Callisto, Europa and Ganymede, which are believed to have vast oceans tucked beneath thick covers of ice.
The unmanned craft, far larger and more powerful than any other sent to explore the outer solar system, would spend years studying the moons' makeup, geologic history and potential for sustaining life, as well as Jupiter itself.
I just don't trust NASA as structured now nor the bureaucratic nature of the rest of government to do it right.
Posted by rodya at 9:02am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Last week in someone's comments, I think it was at Tim Blair's, I saw a complaint that America was in its third century of anti-intellectualism. The poor guy seemed pretty tossed about the whole idea. One can only assume because he saw himself as an unappreciated intellectual. I'd hate to think that it was worse and that he was one of those empties who waits for an intellectual to speak so that they'll have some words and ideas to quote condescendingly when faced with having to come up with an argument of their own.
I am an anti-intellectual. Not in the sense that I am against the pursuit of art, literature or poetry, though I do admit that all of those are beyond me, but in the sense of giving over importance to the whims of intellectuals to tell me how best to order my life. I especially object to the idea of having my earnings forcibly removed from me in order to pay someone to sit there and tell me how to live my life. This does not mean that I do not take the advice of true experts. That would be foolishness. Despite what many intellectuals seem to think, they are not the opposite of fools. In fact, there is quite an intersection between the two.
Generally in America, we're more into those who do things rather than those who talk about things. Results versus abstractions. That's why Henry Ford is still so highly regarded. Intellectuals love to point out how much the guy didn't know as if that was proof of an idiocy. He knew nearly nothing of history or literature or anything an intellectual prizes, but that didn't stop him from being more influential and transforming than just about any modern intellectual. Doesn't hurt that we gloss over his anti-Semitism, but at least that might give intellectuals one area to admire him. And, yes, that was a completely unreasonable cheap shot.
My main objection, and aren't you happy I'm getting to it right away so that this will be short as long as I limit these side comments, to intellectuals is that they are far more likely to see fault and lay blame on The People™ rather than on their own plans, and intellectuals always have plans, or ideas. This is as true of many libertarians as it is of a socialist, pinko commie or right-wing religiouser. It is the source of the famous phrase, "Well, it hasn't been tried yet!" Yes, it has. But your plan didn't allow for people to be people. When Perfect Plan meets Flawed People backed with the Power of the State, well, bad things happen. History shows us that lots of people end up dead because the plan can't be wrong; they are.
So I'll continue to be happy to just let intellectuals talk away in their disconnect. Should a good idea pop out, I'll be sure to take it under advisement. But no way I'm handing over the keys to my life just because someone has declared herself an intellectual or my better.
Posted by rodya at 8:56am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Posts I Want To Delete
2004 is going to be one humdinger of a year. Not just the insanity that will surround the election and the absolute idiotic show that will be put on beforehand outside the Republican convention, but we also have Olympic Games in Athens.
For security reasons, American track and field athletes at the Olympic Games in Athens next summer will not wear red, white and blue or anything with "USA" on it when they are not competing.
Some will likely rant about a cowardly decision, how this is hiding from and letting terrorists and anti-Americans win, but I don't know if I can really ask these people living out a lifetime's dream to compete to go out and make a target of themselves.
Posted by rodya at 4:35pm | Comments [2] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Yay! Medicare has been fixed!
"With the Medicare Act of 2003 (search), our government is finally bringing prescription drug coverage to the seniors of America," Bush said before signing the 10-year, $395 billion legislation. "With this law, we're giving older Americans better choices and more control over their health care so they can receive the modern medical care they deserve."
And the clock has started for when Medicare will once again be declared completely broken, not because of bad legislation, of course, but due to the evils of private companies. But, never fear, dear citizen, your brave Congresspeoples and Presidents will always be ready to repeatedly fix it once and for all!
Posted by rodya at 2:44pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Murder discussed as if it were at a quarterly business meeting.
"The martyrdom operations come as waves so there are gaps between the waves," Hamas chief spokesman Abdel-Aziz al-Rantissi told Reuters in an interview. "We are just in the period of a gap between waves."
In other words, all the young people your cowardly asses deluded into choosing murder and death were used up. You had to wait a while for more to become old enough and foolish enough. "Waves". They dehumanize those they kill; they dehumanize those they use to kill.
Posted by rodya at 12:43pm | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Codeword exception alert.
Howard Dean hopes to solidify his standing as the Democratic presidential front-runner with a Southern strategy that calls for courting black lawmakers and spending time and money in key Southern states.
Emphasis added by me since an alert just isn't an alert without emphasis. This is a Class 2 Codeword Exception. Had the article referred to a Republican candidate, the phrase, "Southern strategy" would be read to mean "disgusting, racist exploitation of white Southern men's innate racism and fear of a black planet". However, since this a Democratic candidate, an exception to the usual codeword understanding has been issued so that here it is to be understood as "a good-hearted, puppy encrusted plan of action to win, as fair and square as possible, as many Southern votes as he can".
Posted by rodya at 10:25am | Comments [1] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
Yes, in just three weeks I'll be in lovely Green Bay.
The upper half of a Green Bay man's ear was bitten off in an argument following a weekend dance, police said.
Hey, now. Don't use up all the fun before I get there.
Posted by rodya at 10:18am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
In a Post-Dispatch story about changes of approach by the administration, we get this list of "harsh tactics" that it "imposed".
It held two U.S. citizens in naval brigs without access to lawyers or the outside world.
It imprisoned hundreds of foreigners indefinitely at a U.S. naval base in Cuba.
It subjected thousands of foreign visitors to mass interviews at home.
What the hell is a "mass interview"? Did the Rev. Sun Myung Moon have to officiate?
Posted by rodya at 9:55am | Comments [0] | Trackbacks[0] | Everyday Stuff
