October 22, 2008
01:34 pm
MacBook Pro Unibody 2008: Kneejerk First Impressions
My quick first impressions of the new MacBook Pro; I received my 2.5 model (customized with a 250gb 7200rpm hard drive) today:
- Appears thinner than my old MBP (original 2006 model) due to rounded corners, but this is an optical illusion. It's actually the same thickness, but slightly wider and deeper.
- When open, the screen looks huge and is about 1/4" higher than the old MacBook Pro, which will cause some issues using it on plane tray tables.
- The screen is WAY too reflective.
- The display is nicely bright and sharp under that WAY too reflective glass.
- Despite the Apple product photos, the iSight camera is not invisible behind the glass. It's pretty much as prominent as the old version. In other words, the glass isn't smoked in any way.
- The trackpad button is very loud when clicked. Self-conciously so. Incredibly so. REALLY loud. CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK.
- My old MacBook Pro had a very loud, rattling fan. So far, the new one is very, very quiet.
- The unibody construction is beautiful -- no seams all over the top of it, no plastic edges to collect dirt and hand oils. It doesn't bend or feel rickety like the old one. When placed side by side with the old version, the new one looks exactly like it is promoted: a single piece of aluminum. The old one now looks like mass of varying parts put together like an erector set; like a 1950s movie robot. The new version has no screws, plastic spacers, latches, rubber feet, or even metal surrounds in the ports. It is minimal and elegant. Even the power button and the silkscreened port logos are small and unobtrusive now. If it weren't for the overly reflective screen, I'd say it was a piece of sculpture.
- In a break from Apple's usual planned obsolescence, this version of the MacBook Pro can use the same power adapter as the 3-year-old version. This is wonderful news, since I bought an extra power adapter for the office.
- The all-button track pad works just like the old kind, if you don't think about it and just use it with the muscle memory of the old track pad. But... and this is a big but: if you tend to rest your thumb on the button without thinking, like I do, the track pad stops tracking 'cos it detects two fingers. There isn't any issue with accidentally clicking because the pad requires you to really press down to click -- at least, mine does.
- Migration assistant is kind of a pain this time: had to first do system updates on both laptops to ensure they work together. Then, I couldn't use firewire because old one has FW400 and new one has FW800. (I didn't have any adapter.) I used "Networking" instead, which I decoded as "Ethernet." I don't know if non-techy users would know this.
- Because one has to create a user in the setup in order to update Migration Assistant before transferring, you can't copy over your old user to the same name on the new computer. Be warned: start out with a new, disposable username on the new computer.
- It took 90 minutes to transfer all my data, and happily it all work. No reinstalls of applications were necessary, even with complicated "activated" applications like Adobe Creative Suite.
- WHOA. My ENTER key is missing! I'm freaking out. I didn't need another option key, I really want my ENTER back.
- If you pick it up while open, the display suddenly becomes loose and flops back and forth. It only seems to be rigid when it's sitting flat on the table.
- Bonus! It has a dual layer DVD burner. I didn't know it had that, so I choose to look at it as a bonus.
- One more time: the screen is WAY TOO REFLECTIVE. But it doubles as a mirror when off, so that's a little extra perk.
After just a few minutes playing with it, I have to say: it's much faster, seemingly, than my old one. Thank goodness. 'Cos I've got to do a lot of freelance work on it to pay for it.
My quick first impressions of the new MacBook Pro; I received my 2.5 model (customized with a 250gb 7200rpm hard drive) today:
- Appears thinner than my old MBP (original 2006 model) due to rounded corners, but this is an optical illusion. It's actually the same thickness, but slightly wider and deeper.
- When open, the screen looks huge and is about 1/4" higher than the old MacBook Pro, which will cause some issues using it on plane tray tables.
- The screen is WAY too reflective.
- The display is nicely bright and sharp under that WAY too reflective glass.
- Despite the Apple product photos, the iSight camera is not invisible behind the glass. It's pretty much as prominent as the old version. In other words, the glass isn't smoked in any way.
- The trackpad button is very loud when clicked. Self-conciously so. Incredibly so. REALLY loud. CLUNK. CLUNK. CLUNK.
- My old MacBook Pro had a very loud, rattling fan. So far, the new one is very, very quiet.
- The unibody construction is beautiful -- no seams all over the top of it, no plastic edges to collect dirt and hand oils. It doesn't bend or feel rickety like the old one. When placed side by side with the old version, the new one looks exactly like it is promoted: a single piece of aluminum. The old one now looks like mass of varying parts put together like an erector set; like a 1950s movie robot. The new version has no screws, plastic spacers, latches, rubber feet, or even metal surrounds in the ports. It is minimal and elegant. Even the power button and the silkscreened port logos are small and unobtrusive now. If it weren't for the overly reflective screen, I'd say it was a piece of sculpture.
- In a break from Apple's usual planned obsolescence, this version of the MacBook Pro can use the same power adapter as the 3-year-old version. This is wonderful news, since I bought an extra power adapter for the office.
- The all-button track pad works just like the old kind, if you don't think about it and just use it with the muscle memory of the old track pad. But... and this is a big but: if you tend to rest your thumb on the button without thinking, like I do, the track pad stops tracking 'cos it detects two fingers. There isn't any issue with accidentally clicking because the pad requires you to really press down to click -- at least, mine does.
- Migration assistant is kind of a pain this time: had to first do system updates on both laptops to ensure they work together. Then, I couldn't use firewire because old one has FW400 and new one has FW800. (I didn't have any adapter.) I used "Networking" instead, which I decoded as "Ethernet." I don't know if non-techy users would know this.
- Because one has to create a user in the setup in order to update Migration Assistant before transferring, you can't copy over your old user to the same name on the new computer. Be warned: start out with a new, disposable username on the new computer.
- It took 90 minutes to transfer all my data, and happily it all work. No reinstalls of applications were necessary, even with complicated "activated" applications like Adobe Creative Suite.
- WHOA. My ENTER key is missing! I'm freaking out. I didn't need another option key, I really want my ENTER back.
- If you pick it up while open, the display suddenly becomes loose and flops back and forth. It only seems to be rigid when it's sitting flat on the table.
- Bonus! It has a dual layer DVD burner. I didn't know it had that, so I choose to look at it as a bonus.
- One more time: the screen is WAY TOO REFLECTIVE. But it doubles as a mirror when off, so that's a little extra perk.
After just a few minutes playing with it, I have to say: it's much faster, seemingly, than my old one. Thank goodness. 'Cos I've got to do a lot of freelance work on it to pay for it.
posted by Gene Cowan | category The War with the Customer
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October 21, 2008
07:42 pm
Just this guy, you know?
I love this photo by Time photographer Callie Shell. Barack Obama is often portrayed by his supporters as some kind of mythical figure; I like that this photo (and others) show that he's just a guy -- although I have to say, most people I know don't bother to clean up after themselves, even without an entourage.
I love this photo by Time photographer Callie Shell. Barack Obama is often portrayed by his supporters as some kind of mythical figure; I like that this photo (and others) show that he's just a guy -- although I have to say, most people I know don't bother to clean up after themselves, even without an entourage.
I loved that he cleaned up after himself before leaving an ice cream shop in Wapello, Iowa. He didn't have to. The event was over and the press had left. He is used to taking care of things himself and I think this is one of the qualities that makes Obama different from so many other political candidates I've encountered. Nov. 7, 2007.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 19, 2008
10:11 am
Powell’s real message is so much more important
Something has been bugging me this last week, and I was saddened to see that no one in the media has addressed it. Until finally, Colin Powell brought it up this morning.
A week ago at one of his increasingly jingoistic rallies, John McCain responded to an audience member who called Barack Obama an Arab by saying:
It seems that point he's making is that one can't be Arabic and a decent family man. He's saying that someone's race is something fundamental that makes them a bad person. He just confirmed the ridiculous and ignorant prejudice of those people in his base who believe that someone's racial heritage is indicative of their behavior or beliefs.
Then this morning, Colin Powell redeemed his tarnished reputation -- not by endorsing Obama, but by saying the following:
At this point it doesn't really take any cojones to break with your party and endorse Obama, at least, not if you can see which way the wind is blowing. But to step up and tell it like it is about the racist commentary coming out of your own party? Well, that's something else, considering that the honorable "maverick" John McCain hasn't stepped up to do it.
Something has been bugging me this last week, and I was saddened to see that no one in the media has addressed it. Until finally, Colin Powell brought it up this morning.
A week ago at one of his increasingly jingoistic rallies, John McCain responded to an audience member who called Barack Obama an Arab by saying:
"No, ma'am. He's a decent family man [and] citizen that I just happen to have disagreements with on fundamental issues and that's what this campaign's all about. He's not [an Arab]."
It seems that point he's making is that one can't be Arabic and a decent family man. He's saying that someone's race is something fundamental that makes them a bad person. He just confirmed the ridiculous and ignorant prejudice of those people in his base who believe that someone's racial heritage is indicative of their behavior or beliefs.
Then this morning, Colin Powell redeemed his tarnished reputation -- not by endorsing Obama, but by saying the following:
I'm also troubled by, not what Sen. McCain says, but what members of the party say, and it is permitted to be said such things as: "Well, you know that Mr. Obama is a Muslim." Well, the correct answer is: he is not a Muslim. He's a Christian. He's always been a Christian.
But the really right answer is: What if he is? Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer is: No, that's not America. Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing he or she can be president?
Yet I have heard senior members of my own party drop the suggestion: he's a Muslim, and he might be associated with terrorists. This is not the way we should be doing it in America.
At this point it doesn't really take any cojones to break with your party and endorse Obama, at least, not if you can see which way the wind is blowing. But to step up and tell it like it is about the racist commentary coming out of your own party? Well, that's something else, considering that the honorable "maverick" John McCain hasn't stepped up to do it.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 17, 2008
07:49 am
It was just food to her
The president of the California Republican organization that distributed this image, Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated, said: "I never connected, It was just food to me. It didn't mean anything else."
What do we take away from this? That the people who run Republican organizations are either disgustingly racist or completely, totally ignorant and stupid.
The state party took pains to explain that these people are volunteers and not formally connected to the Party. If it were Democrats who did this, they'd be called a cell. This is how the Republicans are working this year, in a decentralized way just as -- wait for it -- a terrorist organization works. Cells of fanatics who do things like this, who call out racist epithets at rallies, who spread lies that are parroted... and all "unconnected" to the Party providing culpable deniability.
The president of the California Republican organization that distributed this image, Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated, said: "I never connected, It was just food to me. It didn't mean anything else."
What do we take away from this? That the people who run Republican organizations are either disgustingly racist or completely, totally ignorant and stupid.
The state party took pains to explain that these people are volunteers and not formally connected to the Party. If it were Democrats who did this, they'd be called a cell. This is how the Republicans are working this year, in a decentralized way just as -- wait for it -- a terrorist organization works. Cells of fanatics who do things like this, who call out racist epithets at rallies, who spread lies that are parroted... and all "unconnected" to the Party providing culpable deniability.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 16, 2008
11:09 am
Let’s be liberal with our money
Fascinating. Reprinted from and via John Gruber:
These facts are also illustrated nicely in the cartoon I posted earlier.
So, some of us have known these facts for a long time. Why are the Republicans so successful at getting people to believe that they are the masters of finance, that they represent prosperity? Could it be because the Republican party itself is run by a bunch of rich old white men and that people think they'll also be rich if they join them?
Fascinating. Reprinted from and via John Gruber:
Tommy McCall compares the growth of the S&P stock index under Republican and Democratic presidents since 1929:
As of Friday, a $10,000 investment in the S.& P. stock market index would have grown to $11,733 if invested under Republican presidents only, although that would be $51,211 if we exclude Herbert Hoover’s presidency during the Great Depression. Invested under Democratic presidents only, $10,000 would have grown to $300,671 at a compound rate of 8.9 percent over nearly 40 years.
Facts continue to hold a liberal bias.
These facts are also illustrated nicely in the cartoon I posted earlier.
So, some of us have known these facts for a long time. Why are the Republicans so successful at getting people to believe that they are the masters of finance, that they represent prosperity? Could it be because the Republican party itself is run by a bunch of rich old white men and that people think they'll also be rich if they join them?
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 12, 2008
08:10 pm
The New World
I'm watching a new BBC series, "Stephen Fry in America," interested in seeing a look at my own country from the outside eyes. So far, it's a pretty standard travelogue with short vignettes; still, I am feeling an appreciation for the vastness and diversity of our country -- and so far, he's only in New England.
I also feel the bizarre bipolar nature of our national character. As a people we are both incredibly generous and extremely selfish. We are diverse yet xenophobic. We aspire to great things yet we seem to hate intellectual pursuits.
It's a huge country, with mountains and plains and deserts and beaches and Arctic wastes and swamps and cities and forests. And incredible contradictions.
In Boston, Fry meets Harvard pastor and professor of divinity Peter Gomes, a black, gay, Republican Baptist who sums us up thus:
"We dislike complexity, so we will make simple solutions to everything that we possibly can, even when the complex answer is obviously the correct answer or the more intriguing answer. We want a simple yes or no, or a flat-out this, or an absolutely certain that; and the notion that God could have two thoughts simultaneously, and people dear to him who don't look or talk like us, is just hard for many Americans to believe."
I'm watching a new BBC series, "Stephen Fry in America," interested in seeing a look at my own country from the outside eyes. So far, it's a pretty standard travelogue with short vignettes; still, I am feeling an appreciation for the vastness and diversity of our country -- and so far, he's only in New England.
I also feel the bizarre bipolar nature of our national character. As a people we are both incredibly generous and extremely selfish. We are diverse yet xenophobic. We aspire to great things yet we seem to hate intellectual pursuits.
It's a huge country, with mountains and plains and deserts and beaches and Arctic wastes and swamps and cities and forests. And incredible contradictions.
In Boston, Fry meets Harvard pastor and professor of divinity Peter Gomes, a black, gay, Republican Baptist who sums us up thus:
"We dislike complexity, so we will make simple solutions to everything that we possibly can, even when the complex answer is obviously the correct answer or the more intriguing answer. We want a simple yes or no, or a flat-out this, or an absolutely certain that; and the notion that God could have two thoughts simultaneously, and people dear to him who don't look or talk like us, is just hard for many Americans to believe."
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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03:20 pm
Ignorance and Racism: This is McCain’s America
In 2000 the wedge issue was Clinton's affair (even though Clinton wasn't running). In 2004 it was terrorists -- and scary gay people who were coming to marry your sons. In 2008? Combine 2004's terrorist scare tactics with 19th century racism, and there you have the reinvention of the Republican campaign.
I can't even watch anymore. The people who show up at McCain-Palin rallies, the people who believe everything they're told, ask no questions, leap to bizarre conclusions with no evidence at all, make crap up right off the top of their heads, and espouse solid, simple racism. They speak like brainwashed members of some bizarre cult; and like Scientologists, they claim repression or unfair tactics if they are questioned in any way.
This video scares the hell out of me. Completely insane people parroting total lies told by Sarah Palin and John McCain using the exact talking points put out there by the campaign via Fox News. People voting on the basis of race and religion -- and one thing that these people are showing is something that the media seems to be ignoring: that a man with the middle name Hussein must be a Muslim, and if you are a Muslim, you must be a terrorist. These people think that each and every Muslim person on the planet (watch out -- there are about 1.2 BILLION Muslims in the world and they're all coming to get you! Boo!) is a terrorist.
I am flabbergasted and disgusted. These people are jingoistic, racist xenophobes. Plain and simple. And in 2008, this is the new base of the Republican party.
"McCain is for this country, Obama is not."
"Hammas is for Obama."
"Clinton pushed the minority loans."
"We don't know who Obama is."
"You don't know who Obama is."
Update: found this telling quote this evening, from a spectator at a North Carolina Nascar event: “I don’t think the United States is ready for a black person to be president,” said Lucille Anderson, 73, from Lawsonville. “I think the blacks would be mean to us … they’d probably take us over.”
In 2000 the wedge issue was Clinton's affair (even though Clinton wasn't running). In 2004 it was terrorists -- and scary gay people who were coming to marry your sons. In 2008? Combine 2004's terrorist scare tactics with 19th century racism, and there you have the reinvention of the Republican campaign.
I can't even watch anymore. The people who show up at McCain-Palin rallies, the people who believe everything they're told, ask no questions, leap to bizarre conclusions with no evidence at all, make crap up right off the top of their heads, and espouse solid, simple racism. They speak like brainwashed members of some bizarre cult; and like Scientologists, they claim repression or unfair tactics if they are questioned in any way.
This video scares the hell out of me. Completely insane people parroting total lies told by Sarah Palin and John McCain using the exact talking points put out there by the campaign via Fox News. People voting on the basis of race and religion -- and one thing that these people are showing is something that the media seems to be ignoring: that a man with the middle name Hussein must be a Muslim, and if you are a Muslim, you must be a terrorist. These people think that each and every Muslim person on the planet (watch out -- there are about 1.2 BILLION Muslims in the world and they're all coming to get you! Boo!) is a terrorist.
I am flabbergasted and disgusted. These people are jingoistic, racist xenophobes. Plain and simple. And in 2008, this is the new base of the Republican party.
"McCain is for this country, Obama is not."
"Hammas is for Obama."
"Clinton pushed the minority loans."
"We don't know who Obama is."
"You don't know who Obama is."
Update: found this telling quote this evening, from a spectator at a North Carolina Nascar event: “I don’t think the United States is ready for a black person to be president,” said Lucille Anderson, 73, from Lawsonville. “I think the blacks would be mean to us … they’d probably take us over.”
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 11, 2008
09:37 am
And now, a double entendre from our sponsor
Came across this highly sneaky ad today, one that cleverly evokes sex while selling financial services. If you can't see what I'm talking about, perhaps you just have a less dirty mind than I do.
I need to learn how to create subtle, in-your-face, get-more-sex ads like this.
Came across this highly sneaky ad today, one that cleverly evokes sex while selling financial services. If you can't see what I'm talking about, perhaps you just have a less dirty mind than I do.
I need to learn how to create subtle, in-your-face, get-more-sex ads like this.
posted by Gene Cowan | category The War with the Customer
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October 10, 2008
06:12 am
They’re not gonna talk about it
The doublespeak and lies from the McCain camp are so ridiculous and transparent, one can only wonder: even with evidence from the last decade of a less than scholarly electorate, can people really believe this crap? Every question deflected and left unanswered after minutes of rambling propaganda that never nears the subject at hand. Vile attempts to associate the opponent with domestic terrorists from 40 years ago. Hamfisted yet subtle strategies to stoke racism. People basing their voting choice on how "American-sounding" the candidates names are. And the McCain campaign slings all this mud while its leader, boldly and to our faces, pretends as if he is not involved.
Just yesterday I heard him -- not a spokesman and not his VP candidate, but McCain himself -- repeat the new strategic line wherein he says with his first breath that it is inappropriate to link Barack Obama to a terrorist, and then on the next breath explain who the terrorist is and why he is a bad man and gosh, he lives in the same neighborhood as Obama. We're not gonna talk about it, but let me tell you all about what we're not gonna talk about.
That's an honorable man, there.
McCain spokeswoman Nicolle Wallace, on Thursday's "Today":
And by God, they're successful at this strategy. I mean, I've reprinted their slanderous comments right here on my blog.
But here's what I wonder: does this have any effect at all? It seems to me that all their strategies have done nothing but hold on to their wacko, insane, believe-anything base [See the entry below.] These tactics haven't changed the mind of anyone as far as I can tell; are they just designed to stop the bleeding -- or slow it? At this point, if polls are to be believed, we're going to see just what we have been hoping for for years: a huge swing away from the red, even in states formerly thought to be safe Republican territory. Talking dirty isn't going to help McCain. So I have to wonder, in my conspiracy-addled brain: what sneaky, underhanded, fraudulent tactic do the Republicans have up their sleeve to steal this election at the last minute? Even in the face of overwhelming evidence of an imminent Obama win, I am worried.
The doublespeak and lies from the McCain camp are so ridiculous and transparent, one can only wonder: even with evidence from the last decade of a less than scholarly electorate, can people really believe this crap? Every question deflected and left unanswered after minutes of rambling propaganda that never nears the subject at hand. Vile attempts to associate the opponent with domestic terrorists from 40 years ago. Hamfisted yet subtle strategies to stoke racism. People basing their voting choice on how "American-sounding" the candidates names are. And the McCain campaign slings all this mud while its leader, boldly and to our faces, pretends as if he is not involved.
Just yesterday I heard him -- not a spokesman and not his VP candidate, but McCain himself -- repeat the new strategic line wherein he says with his first breath that it is inappropriate to link Barack Obama to a terrorist, and then on the next breath explain who the terrorist is and why he is a bad man and gosh, he lives in the same neighborhood as Obama. We're not gonna talk about it, but let me tell you all about what we're not gonna talk about.
That's an honorable man, there.
McCain spokeswoman Nicolle Wallace, on Thursday's "Today":
Wallace: Nobody in America sitting around the kitchen table this morning, trying to figure out if their jobs are going to be there, if they’re going to be able to afford their mortgages, healthcare, college, cares about Barack Obama working with a former washed-up terrorist. And that’s what Mr. Ayers is. He’s a former domestic terrorist who targeted, in a group called the Weathermen, the Pentagon and the Capitol.
Vieira: But if they don’t care, Nicolle, why is your campaign bringing it up?
Wallace: I was getting to that before you interrupted, Meredith. The point is Barack Obama lied when he was first asked about his association with Mr. Ayers. He called him a guy in the neighborhood. He’s a lot more than a guy in the neighborhood. And why we can’t have a calm, honest discussion about who Mr. Ayers was and then move on to the things people really care about. But here’s why it matters Meredith, if you don’t tell the truth about your associations, if you don’t answer the question honestly the first time you’re asked, not the second, third or fourth — nobody knows when he found out that he was a domestic terrorist. No one can explain to me why he lied and said he was just a guy in the neighborhood … If Barack Obama had answered honestly about his association with Ayers, you and I wouldn’t be having this conversation.
And by God, they're successful at this strategy. I mean, I've reprinted their slanderous comments right here on my blog.
But here's what I wonder: does this have any effect at all? It seems to me that all their strategies have done nothing but hold on to their wacko, insane, believe-anything base [See the entry below.] These tactics haven't changed the mind of anyone as far as I can tell; are they just designed to stop the bleeding -- or slow it? At this point, if polls are to be believed, we're going to see just what we have been hoping for for years: a huge swing away from the red, even in states formerly thought to be safe Republican territory. Talking dirty isn't going to help McCain. So I have to wonder, in my conspiracy-addled brain: what sneaky, underhanded, fraudulent tactic do the Republicans have up their sleeve to steal this election at the last minute? Even in the face of overwhelming evidence of an imminent Obama win, I am worried.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 09, 2008
08:04 pm
In black and white (and red ink)
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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06:58 pm
Know your enemy
Okay, well, you can know them but I certainly won't ever understand them. Whoa.
Okay, well, you can know them but I certainly won't ever understand them. Whoa.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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06:29 pm
Thank goodness for the wordsmiths
My friends will confirm that I often get so apoplectic about politics because I can't ever seem to find the right words to explain what is so clearly taking place. Thankfully, Garrison Keillor always knows how to describe it.
My friends will confirm that I often get so apoplectic about politics because I can't ever seem to find the right words to explain what is so clearly taking place. Thankfully, Garrison Keillor always knows how to describe it.
So the Republicans have decided to run against themselves. The bums have tiptoed out the back door and circled around to the front and started yelling, “Throw the bums out!” They’ve been running Washington like a well-oiled machine to the point of inviting lobbyists into the back rooms to write the legislation, and now they are anti-establishment reformers dedicated to delivering us from themselves. And Mayor Giuliani is an advocate for small-town America. Bravo.
They are coming out for Small Efficient Government the very week that the feds are taking over Fannie and Freddie, those old cash cows, and in the course of a weekend 20 or 50 (or pick a number) billion go floating out the Treasury door. Hello? Do you see us out here? We are not fruit flies, we are voters, we can read and write, we didn’t just fall off the coal truck.
It is a bold move on the Republicans’ part — forget about the past, it’s only history, so write a new narrative and be who you want to be — and if they succeed, I think I might declare myself a 24-year-old virgin named Lance and see what that might lead to. Paste a new face on my Facebook page, maybe become the Dauphin Louie the Thirty-Second, the rightful heir to the Throne of France, put on silk tights and pantaloons and a plumed hat and go on the sawdust circuit and sell souvenir hankies imprinted with the royal fleur-de-lis. They will cure neuralgia and gout and restore marital vigor.
Mr. McCain has decided to run as a former POW and a maverick, a maverick’s maverick, rather than Mr. Bush’s best friend, and that’s understandable, but how can he not address the $3 trillion that got burned up in Iraq so far? It’s real money, it could’ve paid for a lot of windmills, a high-speed rail line in Ohio, some serious R&D. The Chinese, who have avoided foreign wars for 50 years, are taking enormous leaps forward, investing in their economy, and we are falling behind. We’re wasting our chances. The Republican culture of corruption in Washington hasn’t helped.
And a former mayor of a town of 7,000 who hired a lobbyist to get $26 million in federal earmarks is now running against the old-boy network in Washington who gave her that money to build the teen rec center and other good things so she could keep taxes low in Wasilla. Stunning. And if you question her qualifications to be the leader of the free world, you are an elitist. This is a beautiful maneuver. I wish I had thought of it back in school when I was forced to subject myself to a final exam in higher algebra. I could have told Miss Mortenson, “I am a Christian and when you gave me a D, you only showed your contempt for the Lord and for the godly hardworking people from whom I have sprung, you elitist battle ax you.”
In school, you couldn’t get away with that garbage because the taxpayers know that if we don’t uphold scholastic standards, we will wind up driving on badly designed bridges and go in for a tonsillectomy and come out missing our left lung, so we flunk the losers lest they gain power and hurt us, but in politics we bring forth phonies and love them to death. [via Salon]
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 08, 2008
05:15 pm
Soon we’ll need new gas pumps, too
Here's another superlative for the spend-spend-spend-make-our-grandkids-pay Bush administration: the National Debt Clock no longer has enough space to tote up the debt.
Here's another superlative for the spend-spend-spend-make-our-grandkids-pay Bush administration: the National Debt Clock no longer has enough space to tote up the debt.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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04:42 pm
A perfect storm for Obama?
Maybe God wants Obama to win. Why else would She schedule a fiscal melt down just a month before what is arguably the most important election in our lifetime? Why else would the melt down happen at the end of a fiscal quarter, landing our retirement account statements in our mail box just a day or so after a debate focusing on the financial situation? (Mine lost $6,000 this quarter, $11K so far this year.)
The reminders of the failed Republican revolution and its aftermath are mounting every day, and it can only get worse over the next month leading up to the election. And the McCain strategy? Paint Obama as a terrorist who wants to raise taxes.
If the McCain campaign can't manage to come up with something more topical and unique than that, how do we think they could possibly bring "change"?
Obama, at this point, doesn't even need to have a plan for change. He just needs to be different.
Maybe God wants Obama to win. Why else would She schedule a fiscal melt down just a month before what is arguably the most important election in our lifetime? Why else would the melt down happen at the end of a fiscal quarter, landing our retirement account statements in our mail box just a day or so after a debate focusing on the financial situation? (Mine lost $6,000 this quarter, $11K so far this year.)
The reminders of the failed Republican revolution and its aftermath are mounting every day, and it can only get worse over the next month leading up to the election. And the McCain strategy? Paint Obama as a terrorist who wants to raise taxes.
If the McCain campaign can't manage to come up with something more topical and unique than that, how do we think they could possibly bring "change"?
Obama, at this point, doesn't even need to have a plan for change. He just needs to be different.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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October 07, 2008
04:41 pm
Pallin’ around with terrorists
Or should that be Palin around with terrorists?
It's worth noting that the organization Palin is addressing in the video above, AIP (Alaska Independence Party) is dedicated to seccession from the union; was founded by a man who advocated armed insurrection against the United States with such delightful quotes as "My government is my worst enemy. I'm going to fight them with any means at hand." [Salon]
Worse, the party has been supported by Iran, which sponsored an AIP appearance before the United Nations to denounce America.
Or should that be Palin around with terrorists?
It's worth noting that the organization Palin is addressing in the video above, AIP (Alaska Independence Party) is dedicated to seccession from the union; was founded by a man who advocated armed insurrection against the United States with such delightful quotes as "My government is my worst enemy. I'm going to fight them with any means at hand." [Salon]
Worse, the party has been supported by Iran, which sponsored an AIP appearance before the United Nations to denounce America.
Vogler's greatest moment of glory was to be his 1993 appearance before the United Nations to denounce United States "tyranny" before the entire world and to demand Alaska's freedom. The Alaska secessionist had persuaded the government of Iran to sponsor his anti-American harangue.
That's right ... Iran. The Islamic dictatorship. The taker of American hostages. The rogue nation that McCain and Palin have excoriated Obama for suggesting we diplomatically engage. That Iran.
AIP leaders allege that Vogler, who was murdered that year by a fellow secessionist, was taken out by powerful forces in the U.S. before he could reach his U.N. platform. "The United States government would have been deeply embarrassed," by Vogler's U.N. speech, darkly suggests Clark. "And we can't have that, can we?"
The Republican ticket is working hard this week to make Barack Obama's tenuous connection to graying, '60s revolutionary Bill Ayers a major campaign issue. But the Palins' connection to anti-American extremism is much more central to their political biographies.
Imagine the uproar if Michelle Obama was revealed to have joined a black nationalist party whose founder preached armed secession from the United States and who enlisted the government of Iran in his cause? The Obama campaign would probably not have survived such an explosive revelation. Particularly if Barack Obama himself was videotaped giving the anti-American secessionists his wholehearted support just months ago.
Where's the outrage, Sarah Palin has been asking this week, in her attacks on Obama's fuzzy ties to Ayers? The question is more appropriate when applied to her own disturbing associations.
posted by Gene Cowan | category Right = Wrong
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