- Happy Fat Tuesday! Everyone knows about Fat Tuesday, but let me introduce you to a lesser known day of celebration: Skinny Friday. Skinny Friday is always the Friday following Fat Tuesday. Many years ago on Skinny Friday, the venerable and absent-minded Saint Swithins (the patron saint of leaving all your eggs in one basket) led the swizzle sticks off of all international flights. A truly momentous occasion! I will certainly be celebrating Skinny Friday a few days from now, will you?
Besides Skinny Friday and Fat Tuesday, much of the world knows Fat Tuesday by another name: Pancake day! Yep, I am serious. Do me a favor today, every time someone says the word "pancake" near you, I want you to quietly say "bing." Here's more about pancake day. What a great week! Mardi Gras, Pancake day and Skinny Friday!
http://lifehacker.com/5472860/celebrate-pancake-day-with-great-recipes-and-easy-hacks
- My Academy award picks. Don't bother sitting through 3+ hours of dangerous, ill-informed, liberal egomaniacs giving speeches about how great their lives are. I have your Oscar winners right here:
Best Picture: The Hurt Locker. Dear lord, please don't let James Cameron win. Cameron makes movies for pre-teen morons who will see his movies over, and over, and over again. Titanic is unwatchable (I have tried watching it on four different occasions. I can't make it longer than 20 minutes without doubling-over in agony) and Avatar is even worse.
Best Director: Kathryn Bigelow. See above.
Best Actor: Jeff Bridges. I had no idea he has been nominated five times!
Best Actress: Sandra Bullock. Weak nominees this year. Bullock wins it because Streep has won it too many times and the rest of the nominees don't deserve it.
Best Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz. Lock of the night. I saw this movie with my brother and a friend. While walking out of the theater I said to my brother "that guy just won an Oscar." One of the best supporting roles I have ever seen. Waltz is going to be a busy actor the next few years.
Best Supporting Actress: Mo'Nique
For a whole chart of Oscar predictions, follow this link:
http://moviecitynews.com/awards/2010/gurus/gurus_100202.html
- I bought my Nexus One Android phone about a month ago. It is already obsolete! The market is now flooded with smartphones as good or better than my precious Nexus One. Well, not exactly, but if you follow technology it can feel like your brand-new devices are obsolete the moment you purchase them. The next time you buy a new piece of technology, I want you to wait one week, then go to the following website and realize that your shiny new hardware has already gone the way of the dodo bird:
http://www.boygeniusreport.com/
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Friday, February 12, 2010
The Buzz about Artificial Intelligence in New Vegas
- Fallout: New Vegas will get released this fall. The Fallout games are one of the best computer roleplaying series I have ever played. The Fallout world is set in an apocalyptic future, but this particular future is based upon how people viewed the future in the 1950s. It gives the game a unique, eerie, nostalgic feel, even though the game is set a few hundred years from now. Bethesda bought the rights to the Fallout single player franchise from Interplay a few years ago, (rumor has it that Interplay is developing an online multi-player Fallout) and created Fallout 3. Bethesda's version ditched the top-down perspective and made the game into a first person perspective. All three games are ULTRA-VIOLENT, especially the third game, but the violence really does enhance the overall mood of the games. Fallout 3 was a very good game, but not quite as good as the first two games. Fallout 3 was too short and lacked the sense of humor from the original two games. The introductory cut-scenes to these games, whether they are made by Interplay or Bethesda, are a hoot to watch. Here is the intro-cut scence for Fallout: New Vegas:
- A bunch of experts weigh in on when we will have human-level Artificial Intelligence:
http://hplusmagazine.com/articles/ai/how-long-till-human-level-ai
- Twelve smart and memorable quotes about technology:
http://exectweets.com/2010/02/10/12-smart-memorable-and-sometimes-funny-quotes-about-technology/
- Google released their attempt to conquer the social networking craze. It's called Google Buzz, and it seems more a threat to twitter than to Facebook. Here is article explaining Google Buzz. I have no idea at this point if I will use Google Buzz, but it's always fun to try new technology. So far, I have been experimenting with Buzz more on my Nexus One Android phone than on my laptop:
http://lifehacker.com/5467841/google-buzz-explained
- Five stories to follow during the 2012 Winter Olympics:
http://www.wired.com/playbook/2010/02/stories-vancouver-olympics/
- A bunch of experts weigh in on when we will have human-level Artificial Intelligence:
http://hplusmagazine.com/articles/ai/how-long-till-human-level-ai
- Twelve smart and memorable quotes about technology:
http://exectweets.com/2010/02/10/12-smart-memorable-and-sometimes-funny-quotes-about-technology/
- Google released their attempt to conquer the social networking craze. It's called Google Buzz, and it seems more a threat to twitter than to Facebook. Here is article explaining Google Buzz. I have no idea at this point if I will use Google Buzz, but it's always fun to try new technology. So far, I have been experimenting with Buzz more on my Nexus One Android phone than on my laptop:
http://lifehacker.com/5467841/google-buzz-explained
- Five stories to follow during the 2012 Winter Olympics:
http://www.wired.com/playbook/2010/02/stories-vancouver-olympics/
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Pioneers of Computer Science stay up late to watch Red Eye
- Grace Hopper, one of the first female computer scientists. Next time you feel like you are having trouble fitting in at work, think about Grace:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/05/think-its-hard-being-a-woman-in-tech-try-it-in-the-1940s/
- Red Eye celebrates three years on the air. It's ratings are better than ever. I am going to keep pushing this show on you people because basically it's the only comedy show we have on TV to counter the left-wing trash on Comedy Central. Greg Gutfeld crushing viewers' emails, Robot Theater, Pinch the NY Times correspondent, and an endless amount of news material to mock, what is not to love about this show!?!? I aint messing around. Watch it or record it!
http://www.mediaite.com/online/red-eye-celebrates-three-year-anniversary-as-show-tops-cnn-prime-time-last-week/
This is an actual billboard posted along the Minnesota interstate. Good lord yes, we miss you!!! Please come back! It will be just like the old-days, I promise!
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/news_cut/archive/2010/02/the_mystery_billboard.shtml
http://techcrunch.com/2010/02/05/think-its-hard-being-a-woman-in-tech-try-it-in-the-1940s/
- Red Eye celebrates three years on the air. It's ratings are better than ever. I am going to keep pushing this show on you people because basically it's the only comedy show we have on TV to counter the left-wing trash on Comedy Central. Greg Gutfeld crushing viewers' emails, Robot Theater, Pinch the NY Times correspondent, and an endless amount of news material to mock, what is not to love about this show!?!? I aint messing around. Watch it or record it!
http://www.mediaite.com/online/red-eye-celebrates-three-year-anniversary-as-show-tops-cnn-prime-time-last-week/
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/news_cut/archive/2010/02/the_mystery_billboard.shtml
Friday, February 05, 2010
For Microsoft and Google, time passes quickly in the Uncanny Valley
- It seems like the older we get, the faster time flies. Well, I got some bad-news for you. Time really does pass by faster the older you get. There are several reasons why this happens.
A child's five senses are new and tend to work better than an adult's senses. That's why it's easy to accidentally scald a baby by putting the child in bathwater that may be too warm for the child, but feels just right to you. Does your child have trouble eating certain foods, especially ones that do not taste great in the first place? A child's sense of taste is stronger than yours. Things that taste good to an adult will taste really good to a child; things that taste bad to an adult will taste really bad to a child. Children can also hear higher frequencies than adults (ed. remember to write about this phenomenon and it's practical uses at a later date.)
Since children's senses are often stronger than an adult, a child takes in more information. Taking in more information causes the world to pass by more slowly. It's an abstract idea, so perhaps a small example will help make my point. Have you ever flipped through a book containing roughly the same picture on each page, and as you quickly flip the pages, the picture begins to move? It's a rudimentary form of animation. Well, with children, their book (ie. their perceptions) has more pages than an adult's, so they flip through the book at a slower pace than an adult.
Children also are not filled with memories, regrets, anxieties, expectations, etc., stuff that fills a person's brain as an adult gets older. During times of boredom or "down-time" an adult will often retreat into their memories or worries to fill the time without even knowing they are doing so. A child has no such mechanisms for time-passing, so they literally must sit and wait for time to pass.
So the next time you are in the waiting room of a doctor's office, and your child is bouncing off the walls while waiting to see the doctor, remember that for your child, time really is passing slower than it is passing for you. Here is an article explaining some of the details I just mentioned:
http://www.wbur.org/npr/122322542
- Comparison of Microsoft vs. Google vs. Apple. Wonderful comparisons:
http://www.better-trades.com/analyst-exchange/tech-comparisons/google-vs-apple-vs-microsoft.asp
- The Uncanny Valley. It's a term used to describe how realistic a human character can be in an animation or computer simulation without getting so realistic that it begins to creep-out the people watching the human character. The movie Polar Express and Beowulf suffered from this phenomenon. The characters in those movies seemed more realistic than typical animation characters, but not quite realistic enough to fool viewers into thinking they were actually human. The characters from those two movies fell into the Uncanny Valley. The Uncanny Valley theory has become quite popular in the realm of Human Computer Interaction. It's a real problem for graphic designers and software animators. This clip from 30 Rock does an excellent job of explaining the problem:
http://kotaku.com/384789/the-uncanny-valley-explained-in-terms-of-porn-and-star-wars
- A good friend of mine has started a non-partisan organization dedicated towards solving the school funding problems in Colorado. A worthy issue and certainly worthy of your time. Here is the website:
http://wickerdalewalkers.blogspot.com/
A child's five senses are new and tend to work better than an adult's senses. That's why it's easy to accidentally scald a baby by putting the child in bathwater that may be too warm for the child, but feels just right to you. Does your child have trouble eating certain foods, especially ones that do not taste great in the first place? A child's sense of taste is stronger than yours. Things that taste good to an adult will taste really good to a child; things that taste bad to an adult will taste really bad to a child. Children can also hear higher frequencies than adults (ed. remember to write about this phenomenon and it's practical uses at a later date.)
Since children's senses are often stronger than an adult, a child takes in more information. Taking in more information causes the world to pass by more slowly. It's an abstract idea, so perhaps a small example will help make my point. Have you ever flipped through a book containing roughly the same picture on each page, and as you quickly flip the pages, the picture begins to move? It's a rudimentary form of animation. Well, with children, their book (ie. their perceptions) has more pages than an adult's, so they flip through the book at a slower pace than an adult.
Children also are not filled with memories, regrets, anxieties, expectations, etc., stuff that fills a person's brain as an adult gets older. During times of boredom or "down-time" an adult will often retreat into their memories or worries to fill the time without even knowing they are doing so. A child has no such mechanisms for time-passing, so they literally must sit and wait for time to pass.
So the next time you are in the waiting room of a doctor's office, and your child is bouncing off the walls while waiting to see the doctor, remember that for your child, time really is passing slower than it is passing for you. Here is an article explaining some of the details I just mentioned:
http://www.wbur.org/npr/122322542
- Comparison of Microsoft vs. Google vs. Apple. Wonderful comparisons:
http://www.better-trades.com/analyst-exchange/tech-comparisons/google-vs-apple-vs-microsoft.asp
- The Uncanny Valley. It's a term used to describe how realistic a human character can be in an animation or computer simulation without getting so realistic that it begins to creep-out the people watching the human character. The movie Polar Express and Beowulf suffered from this phenomenon. The characters in those movies seemed more realistic than typical animation characters, but not quite realistic enough to fool viewers into thinking they were actually human. The characters from those two movies fell into the Uncanny Valley. The Uncanny Valley theory has become quite popular in the realm of Human Computer Interaction. It's a real problem for graphic designers and software animators. This clip from 30 Rock does an excellent job of explaining the problem:
http://kotaku.com/384789/the-uncanny-valley-explained-in-terms-of-porn-and-star-wars
- A good friend of mine has started a non-partisan organization dedicated towards solving the school funding problems in Colorado. A worthy issue and certainly worthy of your time. Here is the website:
http://wickerdalewalkers.blogspot.com/
Tuesday, February 02, 2010
The death of voice-mail, join the empire, and how to shamefully buy influence on twitter
- A few weeks ago I posted a link to an article containing medal count predictions for the Winter games. Here is an article from the AP with predictions for each and every event:
http://wintergams.ap.org/story.aspx?st=id&id=154df946a7af484f9722b487ccb2537d
- When I bought my Nexus One Android OS phone, it came with an invitation to Google Voice. Google Voice is a website and application that will take over the voice-messaging on your smartphone. It will capture your incoming voice mail, transcribe it, and then either email the transcribed voice-mail to you, send it to you via a text message, and post it on your google voice account. Incredible technology. The following link has a clever cartoon explaining how I felt about voice-mail before I started using google voice:
http://www.thedoghousediaries.com/?p=1237
- In an earlier post I wrote about people dedicated towards stealing World of Warcraft accounts so they can farm in-game gold and then sell the gold for real money. Did you know that people also sell their twitter accounts on ebay for basically the same idea? There are all kinds of people who either have thousands of followers on twitter, or promise they can get you thousands of followers, and then sell those twitter accounts based upon a cost per twitter follower. For example, if a twitter account has 10,000 followers, they may sell the account for $0.10 per follower, hoping to sell the whole account for $1000. Good grief:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/01/31/twitter-followers-ebay-penny/
- Star Wars propaganda posters. I got a kick-out of this one because Vader actually could do it alone, but having an almost limitless number of stormtroopers at your disposal helps speed up the process:
More Star Wars propaganda posters at the following link:
http://nedhardy.com/2010/01/28/9-awesome-star-wars-propaganda-posters/
http://wintergams.ap.org/story.aspx?st=id&id=154df946a7af484f9722b487ccb2537d
- When I bought my Nexus One Android OS phone, it came with an invitation to Google Voice. Google Voice is a website and application that will take over the voice-messaging on your smartphone. It will capture your incoming voice mail, transcribe it, and then either email the transcribed voice-mail to you, send it to you via a text message, and post it on your google voice account. Incredible technology. The following link has a clever cartoon explaining how I felt about voice-mail before I started using google voice:
http://www.thedoghousediaries.com/?p=1237
- In an earlier post I wrote about people dedicated towards stealing World of Warcraft accounts so they can farm in-game gold and then sell the gold for real money. Did you know that people also sell their twitter accounts on ebay for basically the same idea? There are all kinds of people who either have thousands of followers on twitter, or promise they can get you thousands of followers, and then sell those twitter accounts based upon a cost per twitter follower. For example, if a twitter account has 10,000 followers, they may sell the account for $0.10 per follower, hoping to sell the whole account for $1000. Good grief:
http://www.techcrunch.com/2010/01/31/twitter-followers-ebay-penny/
- Star Wars propaganda posters. I got a kick-out of this one because Vader actually could do it alone, but having an almost limitless number of stormtroopers at your disposal helps speed up the process:
More Star Wars propaganda posters at the following link:
http://nedhardy.com/2010/01/28/9-awesome-star-wars-propaganda-posters/
Friday, January 29, 2010
Inventions, bullet trains, Villains, WoW populations and space exploration
- Apple announced the iPad a few days ago. The best description I have read so far is that it's a giant iPhone Touch. I think it's the ultimate ebook reader, but not much more. It's certainly not a game-changer like the iPhone or iPod. In the spirit of technology innovation, here are 15 devices that were WAY ahead of their time:
- Population reports for World of Warcraft. Absolutely fascinating stuff if you happen to play WoW:
- Are bullet-trains coming to America? If we can find ways to privately fund their construction, then I hope so. Lengthy article about the potential of high-speed railways in the U.S.
- Speaking of funding, I loathe taxes. To me, taxes = freedom. The more money you have, the more freedom you have. There aren't many things I am willing to spend taxes on. I am more than willing to throw my hard-earned money into space exploration. Lord knows I am no greenie, conservationist or progressive, but some day in the future we are going to run out of resources or real-estate. It may happen 300 years from now or 10,000 years from now, but it will happen. The sooner we start working towards permanently getting off this crazy blue rock, the better. Unfortunately, Obama is planning to kill the latest manned moon missions.
- My top five movie villains. The first three were easy to pick and should draw a fair amount of agreement. The last two were very difficult to pick. I could fill the last two spots with fifty different villains. Oh, and unlike my previous lists, they are in order, with the greatest movie villain in the first spot:
1. Vader
2. Wicked Witch of the West
3. Hannibal Lecter
4. Amon Goeth (Schindler's List)
5. Hal 9000
There are many ways to define a movie villain, here is how I define mine...while watching the movie if I was rooting against the character, they are a villain. Using this rule, characters like Michael Corleone, Tyler Durden, etc. cannot be on my favorite movie villains list. In other words, anti-heroes are not villains. Who are your top five villains? Post your top five in the comments section.
Monday, January 25, 2010
Desktop demise, the senate and quick-draw
- Do you own a desktop computer? Do me a favor, please do not upgrade it. Do not buy a new desktop when your old one goes dead. Please do not spend a dime on your desktop ever again! "He's dead, Jim." Nowadays laptops can do everything a desktop can do. Laptops are roughly the same price as desktops and since they are obviously more portable than a desktop, they are much more convenient. I cannot imagine I will ever buy a desktop computer again.
If you believe my initial hypothesis, then you must be thinking "If desktops are dead, then what kind of laptop do I buy?" Ah ha! That's the 21st century rub. There are several categories of laptops and the most popular way to categorize them is by diagonal screen size:
15 inch to 17 inch: These laptops are typically just as fast a desktop computer. They can be a bit bulky and heavy. If you are seriously into gaming on the go, are far-sighted, or love watching movies on your laptop then a larger laptop may be for you. I shy away from larger laptops because I find them inconvenient to carry.
13 or 14 inch: A few of these laptops are just as powerful as their bigger brothers, but the souped-up 13 or 14 inch laptops often have problems dissipating heat. I can't tell you the amount of time I have spent trying to find the perfect 13 inch gaming laptop.
10 to 12 inch: These laptops are frequently referred to as "netbooks." They are the hottest-selling kind of laptop on the market right now. You can't play games on these (at least, not the newest games), you can't run 30 programs at once and obviously the screen sizes are tiny, but boy are they convenient. I currently own the Lenovo S12 ION netbook. It's a hybrid between a regular laptop and a netbook. It has a gaming video card inside of it, thus giving it cross-over appeal.
So we have mentioned desktops, laptops and notebooks, but let's add another category to the list...smartbooks! What is a smartbook? It's a brand-new computer term. A smartbook is a combination of a netbook and a smartphone. It's as small or smaller than a netbook, and it has constant 3G internet connectivity, just like a smartphone. Could smartbooks be the next wave of PC technology? Smartbooks do not (and likely will never) run a version of windows. Smartbooks don't even have "intel-inside." You can read more about smartbooks and the categories I describe above at the following link:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10251841-64.html
- Want to know if a plant is edible? Try the universal edibility test:
http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/universal-edibility-test.htm
- I was watching Blazing Saddles last night. Gene Wilder is my favorite part of that movie and it got me thinking...who are the fastest quick-draw movie characters? Here's my top five, once again in no particular order:
1. The Waco Kid (Blazing Saddles)
2. Doc Holliday (Tombstone)
3. Sundance Kid (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid)
4. Joe (A Fistful of Dollars. Clint Eastwood)
5. ....
I will let you decide who #5 should be. Please use the comments section to give us your opinion.
If you believe my initial hypothesis, then you must be thinking "If desktops are dead, then what kind of laptop do I buy?" Ah ha! That's the 21st century rub. There are several categories of laptops and the most popular way to categorize them is by diagonal screen size:
15 inch to 17 inch: These laptops are typically just as fast a desktop computer. They can be a bit bulky and heavy. If you are seriously into gaming on the go, are far-sighted, or love watching movies on your laptop then a larger laptop may be for you. I shy away from larger laptops because I find them inconvenient to carry.
13 or 14 inch: A few of these laptops are just as powerful as their bigger brothers, but the souped-up 13 or 14 inch laptops often have problems dissipating heat. I can't tell you the amount of time I have spent trying to find the perfect 13 inch gaming laptop.
10 to 12 inch: These laptops are frequently referred to as "netbooks." They are the hottest-selling kind of laptop on the market right now. You can't play games on these (at least, not the newest games), you can't run 30 programs at once and obviously the screen sizes are tiny, but boy are they convenient. I currently own the Lenovo S12 ION netbook. It's a hybrid between a regular laptop and a netbook. It has a gaming video card inside of it, thus giving it cross-over appeal.
So we have mentioned desktops, laptops and notebooks, but let's add another category to the list...smartbooks! What is a smartbook? It's a brand-new computer term. A smartbook is a combination of a netbook and a smartphone. It's as small or smaller than a netbook, and it has constant 3G internet connectivity, just like a smartphone. Could smartbooks be the next wave of PC technology? Smartbooks do not (and likely will never) run a version of windows. Smartbooks don't even have "intel-inside." You can read more about smartbooks and the categories I describe above at the following link:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-10251841-64.html
- A map showing the state of each senate race for the 2010 elections. Thanks Mr. Rove!
- Want to know if a plant is edible? Try the universal edibility test:
http://adventure.howstuffworks.com/universal-edibility-test.htm
- I was watching Blazing Saddles last night. Gene Wilder is my favorite part of that movie and it got me thinking...who are the fastest quick-draw movie characters? Here's my top five, once again in no particular order:
1. The Waco Kid (Blazing Saddles)
2. Doc Holliday (Tombstone)
3. Sundance Kid (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid)
4. Joe (A Fistful of Dollars. Clint Eastwood)
5. ....
I will let you decide who #5 should be. Please use the comments section to give us your opinion.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
What's next, Poe's secret admirer and the real Jack Bauer
- "What's next Ridley?" The Right stuff.
What will Obama do next, now that Scott Brown has won the senate seat in Massachusetts? Brown's victory last night can only be interpreted one way...as a repudiation of Obama's policies over the past year. If a democrat cannot win in one of the most blue states in the union, imagine how the rest of the electorate feels? Oh sure, Coakley was a lazy campaigner and Brown ran a clever, semi-populist campaign, but Brown pounded Obama and his agenda. Brown didn't necessarily run as a Republican, but he certainly ran as a Tea party conservative, which is close enough.
As I stated on my facebook page, tonight's election results are unimpeachable, empirical evidence that in 2008 people voted against George W. Bush and voted for the personality of Barak Obama. They did not vote for Obama's policies. The average American voter cannot stand Obama's policies. The blue-dog democrats in red and purple states must be quaking in their boots after the Brown win. Steam-boat Teddy is spinning in his grave!
So, I ask again, what will Obama do now? Bill Clinton faced basically the same decision in 1994, although he was in a much more dire situation. Clinton had just lost the house of representatives and the senate to the republicans during the mid-term elections. Clinton very wisely moved towards the center, made the republicans into the bad-guys and won re-election. Will Obama do the same? Will Obama lurch towards the middle? Will we see Obama the politician or Obama the liberal? My best guess is we will see Obama the politician. I think Obama is truly a liberal at heart, but the only thing better than getting elected president of the United States is being president of the United States. I think he will do almost anything to keep the job, and that includes becoming a moderate for a little while. For the next few weeks Obama will stick to his message, but casually he will let the healthcare bill die a quiet death. I wouldn't be surprised if sometime in March or April Obama pushes for some middle-class tax cuts and maybe asks for even more money to fight the war in Afghanistan.
Late tonight I stumbled upon this youtube video. Hitler's reaction to Scott Brown winning the Massachusetts senate race. Please watch it. I guarantee you will get a kick out of it:
- I have started a list of the political twitter feeds I follow. Good stuff. This list was on fire Tuesday night!
http://twitter.com/Greymarch/politics
- Every year, for the past sixty years, a mysterious stranger has left a bottle of cognac and roses on the gravesite of Edgar Allen Poe. The clandestine Poe fan didn't show up this year. Let's hope the tradition has not ended:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,583347,00.html
- For the last three years I have tried to watch the TV show 24. I know it has a loyal following and many people much smarter than me love this show, but I just cannot get into it. I have honestly, more than once, given it a fair try. The show is too silly, too unrealistic for me. Characters talk at each other instead of to each other. Here is an article about the real Jack Bauers in our world and how different they are from the TV character:
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NTYyYTlhMzg5OWY1OThlMDA0ZjIxNmMzNjg2N2E1NWU=
What will Obama do next, now that Scott Brown has won the senate seat in Massachusetts? Brown's victory last night can only be interpreted one way...as a repudiation of Obama's policies over the past year. If a democrat cannot win in one of the most blue states in the union, imagine how the rest of the electorate feels? Oh sure, Coakley was a lazy campaigner and Brown ran a clever, semi-populist campaign, but Brown pounded Obama and his agenda. Brown didn't necessarily run as a Republican, but he certainly ran as a Tea party conservative, which is close enough.
As I stated on my facebook page, tonight's election results are unimpeachable, empirical evidence that in 2008 people voted against George W. Bush and voted for the personality of Barak Obama. They did not vote for Obama's policies. The average American voter cannot stand Obama's policies. The blue-dog democrats in red and purple states must be quaking in their boots after the Brown win. Steam-boat Teddy is spinning in his grave!
So, I ask again, what will Obama do now? Bill Clinton faced basically the same decision in 1994, although he was in a much more dire situation. Clinton had just lost the house of representatives and the senate to the republicans during the mid-term elections. Clinton very wisely moved towards the center, made the republicans into the bad-guys and won re-election. Will Obama do the same? Will Obama lurch towards the middle? Will we see Obama the politician or Obama the liberal? My best guess is we will see Obama the politician. I think Obama is truly a liberal at heart, but the only thing better than getting elected president of the United States is being president of the United States. I think he will do almost anything to keep the job, and that includes becoming a moderate for a little while. For the next few weeks Obama will stick to his message, but casually he will let the healthcare bill die a quiet death. I wouldn't be surprised if sometime in March or April Obama pushes for some middle-class tax cuts and maybe asks for even more money to fight the war in Afghanistan.
Late tonight I stumbled upon this youtube video. Hitler's reaction to Scott Brown winning the Massachusetts senate race. Please watch it. I guarantee you will get a kick out of it:
- I have started a list of the political twitter feeds I follow. Good stuff. This list was on fire Tuesday night!
http://twitter.com/Greymarch/politics
- Every year, for the past sixty years, a mysterious stranger has left a bottle of cognac and roses on the gravesite of Edgar Allen Poe. The clandestine Poe fan didn't show up this year. Let's hope the tradition has not ended:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,583347,00.html
- For the last three years I have tried to watch the TV show 24. I know it has a loyal following and many people much smarter than me love this show, but I just cannot get into it. I have honestly, more than once, given it a fair try. The show is too silly, too unrealistic for me. Characters talk at each other instead of to each other. Here is an article about the real Jack Bauers in our world and how different they are from the TV character:
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NTYyYTlhMzg5OWY1OThlMDA0ZjIxNmMzNjg2N2E1NWU=
Friday, January 15, 2010
Pass the biscuits, probabilities and Nexus One fun
- Let's do some politicing. As Pappy O'Daniels would say, "This ain't no one-timin'. We are mass-communicatin'!"
Neither Senator Dorgan (D) from North Dakota nor Senator Dodd from Connecticut (D) will run for re-election in 2010. North Dakota is one of the most conservative states in the union, so chalk that seat up to Republicans. Dodd's poll numbers are at rock-bottom. Republicans would actually prefer Dodd ran for re-election. The attorney general of Connecticut, a popular democrat, will run instead of Dodd for the Connecticut seat. Expect the democrats to keep the seat after the 2010 election. With the North Dakota seat likely going red, the democratic super-majority is virtually guaranteed to disappear after the 2010 election. Republicans will likely pick up from 3 to 6 seats in the Senate after the 2010 elections. Not enough to win back the majority, but certainly enough to block or change some of Obama's agenda (including judicial appointments.)
Ted Kennedy's seat is up for special election this Tuesday and the most recent polls have the Republican Scott Brown with a small lead. Hmmm...I think my toes feel a little numb because HELL MUST BE FREEZING OVER! A republican may take car-barge Teddy's seat in Massachusetts! Obama is traveling to Boston Sunday to campaign for the democrat. You think getting rejected in Copenhagen during the Olympic selection committee meetings was a slap in the face to Obama, watch what happens if Brown wins that senate seat.
To follow politics, I recommend reading The Corner at National Review everyday and read the new website the Daily Caller:
http://corner.nationalreview.com/
Speaking of the Daily Caller, here is an article about how your local news is really just an annoying nanny:
http://dailycaller.com/2010/01/15/confessions-of-an-anchorman/
- As we slowly approach the 2012 elections, I will try to mention potential Republican presidential candidates who catch my eye. I think I mentioned Tim Pawlenty in a previous post (ed. If I didnt, I will in the future.) John Thune is another Republican to watch. Thune is a senator from South Dakota, specifically he is the politician who knocked-off then Senator majority leader Tom Daschle. The pros and cons for Thune:
Pros:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20100113/pl_politico/31431
- Top ten most remote places on earth:
http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-most-remote-places-on-planet-earth.php
- If you roll a six-sided die, what are the chances it comes up a 6? The chances are 1 in 6. If you roll the same die 199 more times and it doesn't turn up a 6 on any of those rolls, on the 200th roll what are the chances it comes up a 6? The chances are exactly the same, 1 in 6. Before you roll the die, if you think to yourself, what are the chances that the die will turn up a 6 at least once, if I roll it 200 times in a row? Now, that's very different than the first two examples. The following website explains these simple laws of probability. Although the website applies to the likelihood of magical items dropping in World of Warcraft, it applies to all games of chance. Next time you go to Vegas, understand these simple probability laws, and you will lose less money:
http://www.wow.com/2010/01/13/drop-chance-probability/
- How to unlock and root your Google Nexus One phone:
http://androidandme.com/2010/01/hacks/video-how-to-unlock-and-root-a-nexus-one/
- It seems like every website on the net devoted to the Android OS has a twitter page, so I have accumulated all of the Android-based twitter pages I follow and put them into one twitter list. Feel free to share this list, steal, and even claim it as your own:
Neither Senator Dorgan (D) from North Dakota nor Senator Dodd from Connecticut (D) will run for re-election in 2010. North Dakota is one of the most conservative states in the union, so chalk that seat up to Republicans. Dodd's poll numbers are at rock-bottom. Republicans would actually prefer Dodd ran for re-election. The attorney general of Connecticut, a popular democrat, will run instead of Dodd for the Connecticut seat. Expect the democrats to keep the seat after the 2010 election. With the North Dakota seat likely going red, the democratic super-majority is virtually guaranteed to disappear after the 2010 election. Republicans will likely pick up from 3 to 6 seats in the Senate after the 2010 elections. Not enough to win back the majority, but certainly enough to block or change some of Obama's agenda (including judicial appointments.)
Ted Kennedy's seat is up for special election this Tuesday and the most recent polls have the Republican Scott Brown with a small lead. Hmmm...I think my toes feel a little numb because HELL MUST BE FREEZING OVER! A republican may take car-barge Teddy's seat in Massachusetts! Obama is traveling to Boston Sunday to campaign for the democrat. You think getting rejected in Copenhagen during the Olympic selection committee meetings was a slap in the face to Obama, watch what happens if Brown wins that senate seat.
To follow politics, I recommend reading The Corner at National Review everyday and read the new website the Daily Caller:
http://corner.nationalreview.com/
Speaking of the Daily Caller, here is an article about how your local news is really just an annoying nanny:
http://dailycaller.com/2010/01/15/confessions-of-an-anchorman/
- As we slowly approach the 2012 elections, I will try to mention potential Republican presidential candidates who catch my eye. I think I mentioned Tim Pawlenty in a previous post (ed. If I didnt, I will in the future.) John Thune is another Republican to watch. Thune is a senator from South Dakota, specifically he is the politician who knocked-off then Senator majority leader Tom Daschle. The pros and cons for Thune:
Pros:
- Tall (dont underestimate this. This is important.)
- Handsome
- Popular at home and with Republicans
- No major scandals attached to him
- Known as a giant-killer
- Solid conservative, but not a crazy right-wing nut
- Fairly young (age 48)
- From a very red state
- From a very small state
- Another middle-aged white guy
- Has no clear agenda or issues he is passionate about
http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20100113/pl_politico/31431
- Top ten most remote places on earth:
http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-most-remote-places-on-planet-earth.php
- If you roll a six-sided die, what are the chances it comes up a 6? The chances are 1 in 6. If you roll the same die 199 more times and it doesn't turn up a 6 on any of those rolls, on the 200th roll what are the chances it comes up a 6? The chances are exactly the same, 1 in 6. Before you roll the die, if you think to yourself, what are the chances that the die will turn up a 6 at least once, if I roll it 200 times in a row? Now, that's very different than the first two examples. The following website explains these simple laws of probability. Although the website applies to the likelihood of magical items dropping in World of Warcraft, it applies to all games of chance. Next time you go to Vegas, understand these simple probability laws, and you will lose less money:
http://www.wow.com/2010/01/13/drop-chance-probability/
- How to unlock and root your Google Nexus One phone:
http://androidandme.com/2010/01/hacks/video-how-to-unlock-and-root-a-nexus-one/
- It seems like every website on the net devoted to the Android OS has a twitter page, so I have accumulated all of the Android-based twitter pages I follow and put them into one twitter list. Feel free to share this list, steal, and even claim it as your own:
Tuesday, January 12, 2010
Winter Olympics, Emails, Red Eye, Android OS, Foul-mouthed movie characters
- The Vancouver winter Olympics start February 12th. Us lucky kids who live in the western U.S. get to watch the events live. Should be good fun. Here is an article predicting the U.S. medal count. My prediction? U.S. finishes with a total of 20 medals, putting us in third place for the medal count, behind Germany and Canada:
- Have you noticed that when you send or receive emails using a web email client, like gmail, hotmail, yahoo, aol, etc., advertisements often will appear to the left or right of your email, or even contained in your email? The email programs crawl your email just before you receive it, and generate ads for your viewing pleasure based upon the content of the email. Besides the obvious privacy issues with letting a company crawl your emails, many web-based email users find the ads annoying and obtrusive. I don't mind the ads; it's the price of using free web-based email clients.
In this age of political correctness, the email programs will try to avoid placing ads into an email which create an obvious offensive or awkward advertisement. For example, if you write an email to a friend about how you are heartbroken your aunt died of melanoma, then you probably wont have an advertisement about sunscreen placed into your email. Knowing this, some web-based email users have devised ways of excluding the ads from their emails. By ending your email with an incredibly controversial sentence, you can avoid almost all advertisements in your web-based emails. The following sentence is the kind of phrase that will do the trick: "The 9/11 nazi terrorist raped and murdered my HIV-stricken child." This sentence sets off all kinds of warnings to the ad generating crawling programs. They wont go anywhere near an email with such a politically incorrect sentence. Obviously, it would be madness to include this sentence in every email you write. People will think you are nuts! So, clever writers have created sentences that are far less offensive to include in your emails. Check out the following link to read more about how you can create sentences that will remove ads from your emails:
- Top 20 best applications for your Nexus One (or Android OS) smartphone:
- Buford T. Justice from Smokey and the Bandit
- Jimmy Serrano, Midnight Run
- Grandpa Gustafson, Grumpy Old Men
- Roman Troy Moronie, Johnny Dangerously
- Tie: Tommy DeVito, Goodfellas and Sergeant Thomas Highway, Heartbreak Ridge.
The are many, many more who deserve to be on this list. Use the comments section to add your favorite foul-mouthed movie characters to the list, but please dont give examples of how foul-mouthed these characters actually are! Let's keep this website PG-rated.
- The Fox News show Red Eye has added a new segment to it's already must-watch TV show. It's called Robot Theater. Check out their lampooning of Media Matters, a left-wing organization devoted to calling out right-wing media bias:
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