A Free and Moral Agent

The First Amendment

2005-03-02T05:54:00.000Z

Some members of the government now want to regulate speech that you PAY to "hear"!

From CNN via Netscape News:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Senate Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Stevens said on Tuesday he would push for applying broadcast decency standards to cable television and subscription satellite TV and radio.

"Cable is a much greater violator in the indecency area," the Alaska Republican told the National Association of Broadcasters, which represents most local television and radio affiliates. "I think we have the same power to deal with cable as over-the-air" broadcasters.

Mr. Stevens has gotten too big for his britches. I'm willing to accept a reasonable argument that some sort of decency standards should be applied to the public airwaves -- it's a decency in the public square issue.

But I have paid for the broadcast via cable/satellite media, and I don't want the government to give a fig about how ::shudders:: indecent ::gasps:: it is. The humanity! So what if someone dares utter The Seven Dirty Words? Cry me a river.

I'm sorry I'm not making a better argument tonight. I'm trying to reinstall VS.NET 2002, and I'm feeling neither coherent nor patient.

State of the Union 2005

2005-01-31T07:25:00.000Z

After President Bush dedicated a considerable portion of his second Inaugural Address to foreign policy (beginning the end of global tyranny, or something...), I'm hoping he spends most of the SotU on domestic stuff. Like what, you ask? ...How about Social Security reform, immigration policy, school vouchers, the national deficit, and tax cuts? Here in my neck of the woods, Proposition 200 is getting some pretty serious attention.

<Digression>

A foreign government is considering challenging an American state in international tribunal. "Human rights experts" say THAT scenario could be "diplomatically embarassing for the United States." Wooo, finally! We were totally peachy until an Arizonan law cut the international mustard. Hoo boy, look out.

</Digression>

Honestly, I don't think there's anything left to be immediately said about Iraq, and the War on Terror, that hasn't been spoken. President Bush even managed (belatedly) to land on the key ideological points of going to war in Iraq, which I think were orders of magnitude more important than the WMD debate. They only thing left at this point is "stay the course."

...Now, tell me about the "thousand points of light."

Newsweek profiles George W. Bush

2005-01-17T06:21:00.000Z

Window of Opportunity (Newsweek)
He's hands-on, detail-oriented and hates 'yes' men. The George Bush you don't know has big dreams—and is racing the clock to realize them.

It's a three page article about the most powerful man in the world, so I recommend you take a look -- whoever you are.

I'll only exerpt one section (you're welcome):

In private, Bush rarely talks about abortion rights and gay marriage. "He doesn't even carry his family on abortion," says one family friend. "He'd probably lose a vote 3-to-1. And I bet he doesn't make one phone call on the constitutional [gay-marriage] amendment."

and I'll ask you to consider it with Andrew Sullivan's comments:

The FMA [Federal Marriage Amendment] has gone unmentioned by Bush since the election - and it appears more and more like a pre-election ploy rather than a principled stand. (Of course, that's a relief but it's also an indication of how bald-faced a political maneuver this was in the first place).

Check out his whole post. Add Mr. Sullivan to the blogroll?

Close the gates

2005-01-16T19:07:00.000Z

Why does every stinkin' Washington scandal since WATERGATE have to end in '-gate'?

- Watergate
- Travelgate
- Docs-in-Socks-gate
- Memogate/Docugate/Rathergate (this one makes senese, sort of. Can you say, poetic justic & irony?)

There are more...can you add to the list?

Dan Rather on SNL

2005-01-16T19:00:00.000Z

I'm a sucker for the political skits on Saturday Night Live. I was literally on the floor, in tears, watching the 2000 Election sketch about "strategery" and "lockbox." (The twit who's currently doing the George W. Bush impressions sucks. Hard. Mr. Bush is many things, but snivelly and whiny don't come to mind. Will Ferrell captured the swagger, the drawl, and the arrogance that people see.)

After Rather/Memo/Docu-gate it was Dan Rather's turn to get sketched last night. Video and transcript at Ratherbiased.com.

"Right on Campus"

2005-01-14T06:51:00.000Z

From today's Opinion Journal (free website registration may be required -- just put in a bogus email address). My friends know I like to post chunks of editorials every once in a while. Trust me, this is a much shorter version. Read away.

Right on Campus
Conservatives begin to infiltrate the left's last redoubt.

BY BRIAN C. ANDERSON
Friday, January 14, 2005 12:01 a.m. EST

Throughout 2003 and into 2004, a surge of protests roiled American campuses. You probably think the kids were agitating against war in Iraq, right? Well, no. Students at UCLA, Michigan and many other schools were sponsoring bake sales to protest . . . affirmative action. For white students and faculty, a cookie cost (depending on the school) $1; blacks and Hispanics could buy one for a lot less.

The principle, the protesters observed, was just that governing university admission practices: rewarding people differently based on race. Indignant school officials charged the bake-sale organizers with "creating a hostile climate" for minority students, oblivious to the incoherence of their position. On what grounds could they favor race preferences in one area (admissions) and condemn them in the other (selling cookies) as racist? Several schools banned the sales, on flimsy pretexts, such as the organizers' lack of school food permits....

...But the left's long dominion over the university--the last place on earth that lefty power would break up, conservatives believed--is showing its first signs of weakening. The change isn't coming from the schools' faculty lounges and administrative offices, of course. It's coming from self-organizing right-of-center students and several innovative outside groups working to bypass the academy's elite gatekeepers....

...The number of College Republicans has almost tripled, from 400 or so campus chapters six years ago, to 1,148 today, with 120,000-plus members (compared with the College Democrats' 900 or so chapters and 100,000 members). College Republicans are thriving even on elite campuses. "We've doubled in size over the last few years, to more than 400 students," reports Evan Baehr, the square-jawed future pol heading the Princeton chapter. The number of College Republicans at Penn has also rocketed upward, says chapter president Stephanie Steward, from 25 or so members a couple of years ago to 700 today. Same story at Harvard. These young Republican activists, trudging into battleground states this fall in get-out-the-vote efforts, helped George W. Bush win....

...Yet for most of the conservative students I interviewed, traditional values did not extend to homosexuality. Though few support gay marriage, fewer still want the Constitution amended to ban it, and most are OK with state-sanctioned civil unions for gays. "I don't buy the prevalent argument that recognizing gay unions would undermine the institution of marriage," says Vanderbilt sophomore Anne Malinee, the strongly pro-life editor of the Vanderbilt Torch, the school's conservative monthly. "Of all the issues elected officials could be focusing on, why this?" Similarly, Bucknell history and economics major Charles Mitchell, culturally conservative in many respects, isn't worried about gay marriage. "I believe that homosexuality is a sin, because that's what the Bible says, but I also believe that if two people of the same sex love each other and can get a priest to marry them, the propriety of that is none of the state's business...."

Republicans on campus will be an interesting development to watch.

Site update

2005-01-13T06:29:00.000Z

Added a blogroll of sorts. These are the political / current events blogs that I read on a relatively regular basis. Categorized for your pleasure. I'll introduce you to each of them as time goes on.

UPDATE: Please post in the comments if you know of any good American liberal blogs (or ANY good blog, for that matter). I'm not terrible enamored with either of the Liberal Weenies I linked.

Homosexuality and the Lutheran Church

2005-01-12T07:25:00.000Z

[Disclaimer: I'm a baptised/confirmed Methodist. I attend my girlfriend's Lutheran church. When I was in elementary school, my family attended a Lutheran church. Methodism and Lutheranism are the two (Christian Protestant) religious denominations I've had most of my religious contact with.]

A task force for the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) has deliberated on the church's official position on homosexuality and will issue its recommendations on Wednesday. An overview is provided on the ELCA's website. There's also a 12/16/04 ELCA News Service PR, and a timeline of the process. The issues at stake are:

Shall the ELCA sanction same-gender relationships?
Shall the ELCA ordain ("roster") individuals in committed same-gender relationship?
What is the ELCA's social statement on sexuality?

My pastor introduced and discussed the first two issues in the past Sunday's sermon. He was very graceful and respectful. The sermon's theme was "Keep Your Eye on the Ball." Pastor reminded us -- gently -- that there any many more, and many more important, parts of being a Christian than getting into a polarizing debate on homosexuality.

Then, Pastor shared his personal thoughts on the issue. My gut feeling is that the ELCA recommendations are going to follow suit.

First, Pastor believes that the ELCA should not sanction same-gender relationships. He believes that governmental avenues, such as civil-unions, would be more appropriate, and have the potential to provide the same legal benefits that are currently available to individuals in heterosexual relationships.

Second, Pastor described this a little differently than the ELCA's website. Pastor said the church was deliberating on rostering homosexual individuals -- which is more specific than "rostering of persons in committed gay or lesbian relationships" (from the ELCA's Introduction). Pastor was not in favor of ordaining homosexuals. Obviously, this also means he would oppose rostering "persons in committed gay or lesbian relationships."

The congregation's response was muted. Mostly, we were digesting the information and figuring out what it all meant. Big-picture stuff. I live in a purple state, so I hope it's fair to say that most people in the congregation were not morally content with something that Pastor said. I was glad to see, though, that almost everyone filed out to shake Pastor's hand after service and give him words of support. It could not have been easy.

Tomorrow: My reaction to my Pastor's statements, my thoughts on the ELCA task force, and if/how the government should be involved.

Wednesday: I attend a Wednesday evening discussion group at my church. I'll have reactions and comments from that. There might even be a roundup from across the web, if you're lucky.

And someday, I can't wait to share the American Exceptionalism Intro with everyone.

American Exceptionalism: A Preview

2005-01-11T08:17:00.000Z

I discovered "American Exceptionalism" at my parents' house over Christmas -- an abandoned book on the shelf. The title piqued my curiousity. It was published in 1996. Our biggest 'threat' back then was Japanese manufacturing.

Lipset's introductory remarks were ...eerie... in some cases, just plain interesting in others. Here's one that struck me as rather prescient:

Protestant-inspired moralism not only has affected opposition to wars, it has determined the American style in foreign relations generally, including the ways we go to war. Support for a war is as moralistic as resistance to it. To endorse a war and call on people to kill others and die for the country, Americans must define their role in a conflict as being on God's side against Satan - for morality, against evil. The United States primarily goes to war against evil, not, in its self-perception, to defend material interests.

Sound familiar? It should. Recall President Bush's 2002 State of the Union Address:

"North Korea..., Iran..., [and] Iraq... constitute an axis of evil, arming to threaten the peace of the world. ... History has called America and our allies to action, and it is both our responsibility and our privilege to fight freedom's fight."

Remember, the book was written in 1996. (I'm not trying to be profound here, just making sure we keep perspective.)

American Exceptionalism, I

2005-01-10T07:56:00.000Z

Over Christmas break, I started to read American Exceptionalism: A Double-Edged Sword, by Seymour Martin Lipset. My plan is

Briefly summarize each chapter as I've read it, and
Discuss the interesting points.

I don't yet know if this means I'll be reading Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty in series or parallel. We'll see how it goes. They'll both be read soon enough, regardless.

Holy Farglesnot!

2005-01-08T18:10:00.000Z

I'm going to keep all the government, politics, current world events stuff here at FMA. The random thoughts / personal blog is at http://holyfarglesnot.blogspot.com.

(There's a link to right location if you accidentally go to farglesnot.blogspot.com)

The Lost Constitution and American Exceptionalism

2005-01-07T08:26:00.000Z

Gonna try and get this going (again, and seriously) in the next month or so. I plan to write about a book Matthew sent me for Christmas (thank-you's are being writ this weekend...) and another one I snatched from home.

If you're curious,

Matthew sent Restoring the Lost Constitution : The Presumption of Liberty
(very cool)
I filched American Exceptionalism: A Double-Edged Sword

Fwiw, I've got another blog in the works for the random stuff -- "Holy Farglesnot." I'll post a link when it's ready to go. Oh, and if you're aware of the OTHER other blog....thanks for the link(s), but I'm going to let it die in oblivion.

New design

2005-01-07T08:23:00.000Z

Working out the kinks, so things are cross-platform. The design goal is how things currently look in Firefox:

Bumper Sticker Poll '04 Update

2004-08-26T06:52:00.000Z

Update.

Current standings:

Bush: 22 (+7)

Kerry: 10 (+3)

Java Tools

2004-08-24T04:13:00.000Z

During the past couple months I've had the opportunity to sift through a variety of tools that help during Java development, and I'd like to highlight them here.

I've collected a suite of tools in the following areas:

Build/Make

Source Code Reformatting

Source Code Analysis

Source Code Metrics

Static Analysis

Complexity Analysis

Integrated Development Enivironments

Test-Driven Development

and once every couple of days, I'll share my thoughts on a different topic.

A More Perfect Presidential Race

2004-08-23T00:16:00.000Z

Instapundit.com: Parallel Universe Kerry's Strategy:

EAST HAMPTON, NY (IP) -- Democratic Presidential nomineee John Kerry laughs when told that most voters don't realize that he served in Vietnam, winning three purple hearts, a bronze star, and a silver star.

"Why should they? That's several wars ago," Kerry laughs. "Old stuff. I'd much rather people be talking about my detailed plan to rebuild Iraq, using an oil trust mechanism that would give the Iraqi people a stake in reconstruction. That's why I focused on that in my acceptance speech at the Democratic Convention. What was I going to do, rehash events from 35 years ago?"

We can dream, can't we?

Olympic Style

2004-08-18T05:33:00.000Z

Is it me, or did Bob Costas hit the Goodwill/retro bins before he went on air? I'd love to show you some vidcaps, but NBC wants my VISA number to "verify that I'm in the United States." Uhhuhhhh.

Java Aggravation

2004-08-17T04:21:00.000Z

In a comment to my C# Everywhere post, Matthew mentioned:

I'll also point out that most of your gripes seem to be related to the Java libraries, not the Java language itself; problems that can more easily be rectified.

And he was right, to a certain extent. I was doing a fair amount of spleen venting.

So after travails at work, I would like to make a specific submission to the "Less Than Easily Recitified 'Features' In Java that Destroy My Soul" list:

String is not a primitive type. ARRGH. Granted java.lang.* frequently is auto-included when you compile your code, but why aren't Strings treated as first-class members of the language?!

This next issue could seem trivial, but it REALLY peeves me. As a programmer, I like consistency, determinism, and all that good stuff. So when I run across something as asinine as the inconsistency of the length arguments for Java arrays and Strings, I
1. Calm the bulging vein in the middle of my forehead
2. Curse the first-born children of the Java language spec writers
For the uninitiated, the length of an array is found using the expression arrayName.length, whereas the length of a String is found using stringName.length().

For arrays you don't use parentheses because length is a property; however, with Strings you do use parentheses because length is a method.

...Well, LAH-TEE-DAH.

Please explain to me, logically, how length is NOT a property of a String? Tongue-tied? Yeah, see -- the proper reaction is ::BOGGLE::.

It's absolutely incomprehensible that in this age of OO programming I should have to remember whether to stick twidly little () when I'm trying to find the length of some objects, but not of others. Be consistent. I either use them all the time, or none of the time.

It's this kind of crap that frustrates CS n00bs, because it forces them to concentrate more on the idiosyncratic tendencies of a language, rather than on the fundamental logic of their algorithms.

Yes, that's how I really feel. :P

Wired News: Modern Students Devour Old Math

2004-08-16T06:27:00.000Z

Wired News: Modern Students Devour Old Math:

MUMBAI, India -- What is the square of 85? In an instant, a 17-year-old boy said without blinking, '7,225.'

Kamlesh Shetty had used a trick from a quaint concept called Vedic math, a ompilation of arithmetic shortcuts believed to have been written by ancient Indians who lived centuries before Christ, during a glorious period in Indian history called the Vedic Age. Its math has now crawled into the 21st century to further Shetty's dream of cracking a nasty engineering entrance exam.

Cool. I should check into this.

Bumper Sticker Poll '04 Update

2004-08-16T05:04:00.000Z

With this weekend's adventures, I was out on the Arizonan roadways. Saw some bumper stickers: Bush had 6, Kerry had 4.

Current standings:

Bush: 15

Kerry: 7

Still alive

2004-08-16T05:03:00.000Z

Had a good weekend, went hiking on Piestewa Peak. Pics coming soon.

C# Everywhere

2004-08-13T06:01:00.000Z

C# r0x0rs my b0x0rs. (Proof for Travis that other people DO say that.) I've been using Java at work, and I'm not thrilled. If you think that C# copied Java, then Gottlieb Daimler and Karl Benz copied Henry Ford.

The lack of enumerations and a miserable excuse for a proper DateTime really really annoy me. Oh, and JSP is friggin gross. You're mixing your logic layer and your presentation layer all over the place. Custom tag libraries, JavaBeans, bah. It's called ASP.NET. That's another rant for another day. I have found good tools support for Java, though. I've found some stuff lately that's been useful. Again, another post.

I was going to write about Mono, Mac OS, GTK and Windows forms, but it all fell apart once I started chatting on AIM. Alas, another post.

A Headline to Enjoy

2004-08-13T05:41:00.000Z

I don't often enjoy reading NYT headlines, but this made me chuckle: Bush's Mocking Drowns Out Kerry on Iraq Vote.

Bumper Sticker Poll 2004

2004-08-10T05:21:00.000Z

I live in the Great State of Arizona, and we're supposed to be one of the critical swing states of the 2004 Presidential Election.

So far, the Democrats have been giving a lot of attention to the state. Governor Janet Napolitano had a featured speaking position at the Democratic National Convention, and Senator Kerry has been running campaign ads on the local TV stations.

On my daily commute and my drives around town, however, I noticed that the number of cars with George W. Bush bumper stickers appeared to significantly outnumber the cars with John F. Kerry bumper stickers. So, I've started the unofficial and highly unscientific Bumper Sticker Poll 2004.

In order for a bumper sticker to get counted, it must:

Advertise a candidate for the 2004 election (i.e., Bush 2000 doesn't count)

Represent a unique instance. I don't count the car in my apartment complex with the Bush '04 bumper sticker every time I see it.

Be noticed after I decided to start the poll. I favor the re-election of President Bush, so this hopefully reduces any bias where I was subconciously only noticing the Bush bumper stickers.

Potential bias of the sample:

I favor the election of President Bush instead of Senator Kerry.

I drive the same route to/from work

My drives around the metro area don't equally cover all areas.

The area where I live may skew towards a specific political party.

Republicans are more likely than Democrats to put bumper stickers on their cars.

Ok, now that I have all the disclaimers out of the way, here's what I've found so far:

Bush: 9 bumper stickers
Kerry: 3 bumper stickers

I'll be curious to see if this is in any way indicative of the electoral results in November. I'll post updates periodically.

WiFi Watch

2004-08-09T07:54:00.000Z

I've started a blog, WifiWatch.blogspot.com to chronicle unconvential, new uses of WiFi.

Attention, Brad Smith!

2004-08-07T17:57:00.000Z

Google Job Opportunities: User Interface Engineer, Blogger

Web Ads

2004-08-07T17:52:00.000Z

I love this one.

Bonny Scotland

2004-08-06T06:32:00.000Z

I was reading an OpinionJournal.com editorial about Theresa Heinz-Kerry's multilingualness and ran across a Scotland reference. The Scottish country is practically as close as we're gonna get to Heaven on Earth -- wonderful place.

Anyways, with a soft spot in my heart, I wanted to pass along this short anecdote:

Regional linguistic variants within Britain alone can be tougher. In about three weeks I'll be heading to Scotland, where I'll go fly fishing with a man named Willy. I won't understand much of what he says (I used to think he thought my name was Ken, because he kept saying it, with a questioning intonation. In fact, he was saying "You know?"). Willy's speech strays into the dialect of Scots, which is arguably more different from English than these four Romance languages are from one another. But if I told Willy he was bilingual he might dump me in the loch.

I'll eventually post on Scotland, I'm sure. And Jesse and I have some good stories.

A Mickey Mouse Operation

2004-08-06T05:49:00.000Z

What genius in marketing came up with this?? Seriously!? (Spoiler: frog design, inc.)

I want to know -- how can that guy keep a straight face while he's having his picture taken? Do you think they'll use these icons to skin the OS?

This is a HUGE jump from those Mickey Mouse face-shaped record players that you could pop in a record and have a book read to you. This, THIS, is a honkin'... ugly piece of plastic that's going to have permanent residence in someone's family room! Are people actually going to buy this? Seriously?

How do you sell that thing to parents? If you want to make a computer for kids, make that sucker ruggedized. Yup, if it is certified for use by our Armed Forces, then it might stand a chance against the snotty-nosed little rugrats running around that thing.

Oy vey. If Disney makes money off that, then I'm in the wrong business.

Catblogging, I

2004-08-05T07:50:00.000Z

UPDATE: More cat photos here.

Whatever you do, don't cross the streams

2004-08-05T07:48:00.000Z

Blog is now open for comments from anyone. You don't have to be registered with Blogger. Say "thanks" to Matthew.

Documentary: Kerry on Iraq

2004-08-05T06:35:00.000Z

Matthew wrote last week

"I also get pretty testy whenever someone points out that Kerry has been on many sides of various issues during the course of his career. You know what? So have I. It's called learning."

To an extent, I hope that a politican -- a public representative -- changes his or her views during their years of service. Rather, that their views evolve. Ideally, this evolution demonstrates education and reflection on the issues of our day. Cynically, and sometimes realistically, a wholesale change of a politician's views demonstrates political expediency.

So as you watch this eleven minute documentary -- yes, it is a documentary: primary sources quoted in full and in context -- please ask yourself if you think Senator Kerry is truly "learning."

Whatever you do, please watch the whole thing. Even if you think it's a piece of garbage, just watch the whole thing and then rant about it here on the website.

Without further ado, Senatory Kerry on Iraq (WMP).

Custom Sage CSS, Part I

2004-08-04T06:51:00.000Z

I noticed that when syndication feeds that contained images (such as the one for this blog) showed up in the Sage viewer, the width of the image would extend past the boundaries of the div. Yuck.

After a little bit of tinkering, I was able to come up with a code snippet that solved the problem. This will resize all images from a syndicated feed, but won't oversize the Technocrati icon.

The basic Sage template is available online from the project's wiki. Now, just add the following code to your custom CSS file for Sage:




img

{

	width: 100%;

}



div.item-technorati img

{

	width:auto;

}

Awesome fractal...

2004-08-04T05:17:00.000Z

"To the End of Night" (full size) from DeviantArt.com:

White House West

2004-08-03T05:33:00.000Z

Just when you thought the 2004 election just wouldn't be the same without Will Ferrell doing his George W. Bush impressions on SNL, we're in luck.

The advocacy group ACT has filmed a 'campaign commercial' starring 'President Bush.' The film lasts several minutes while Bush talks about his re-election bid from his ranch in Crawford, Texas. Yeah, ACT wants to get the Democrats elected and the commercial reflects that...but it's still funny. Absolutely a far cry better than anything that was passing for wit or humor on the DNC's website a couple months ago.

The high-res QuickTime version is available here. For other stream sizes and formats, go to www.whitehousewest.com

Sexiest. Feedreader. Ever.

2004-08-02T06:26:00.000Z

I've been searching for a good feedreader for a while, and it finally dawned on me that I should check for a Mozilla extension. I hit the jackpot with RSS reader panel, Sage.

This little gem sits fulfills all your feedreader fantasies. (Mine, at least).

Fantasy #1: Browser Integration

This is huge. I don't need another stinkin' app to read webpages. Having to keep a separate program open to read my feeds was the greatest barrier to me downloading anything to this point.

Fantasy #2: Organized and Concise Display

I want the information density and semantic structure variables to be pegging off the charts. Check. The Sage feedreader is probably the best use of the sidebar pane in a browser.

The upper part of the pane displays the contents of the folder you've store your feed links in. I've created a subfolder in my Bookmarks called "Sage RSS" -- then I just bookmark an RSS/Atom feed into that folder. Uh huh, you have this mat, with different conclusions written on it that you could jump to. Laugh now, but you'll be amazed how awesomely handy it is.

And that's just the top half. The lower portion displays the titles of all the posts it's reading from the site feed's XML file. Super-quick table of contents.

From a UI standpoint, it's pretty satisfying...for me. There's an absolute minimum of clutter and it's obvious how update your list (click the only button, the "Check Feeds" button). Sage also does a good job at providing user feedback. You know when it's checking feeds, and the updated sites are marked with an asterix.

Finally, for the coup de grâce, the site feeds are displayed as HTML in the browser's content pane....and you can control the presentation via CSS! Most excellent. Sage's default CSS is good, but modern minimalist with a turqoise-greenish flavor. It could work quite well as your display, but I'm going to tweak mine a little.

Alas, Imperfection...

Unfortunately, there are a few minor bugs and missing features I hope will be addressed in future versions:

Automatic checking of feeds at a user-defined time interval

Ignores HTML formatting information that is provided in the site feed (could just be the default CSS)

Selectively chooses to display images in a blogpost

Fix / Remove the 'Feedster' feed searching. It sucks, really.

These small issues aside, I strongly recommend you check out Sage.

Good evening

2004-08-02T05:49:00.000Z

The sunsets here can be beautiful. This was tonight's.

It looks great on my desktop -- if you think it would look good on yours, leave a comment or drop me a line at freemoralagentblog@hotmail.com. I'll send you whatever res you need. (While Photobucket is a great free image hosting service, they limit the size of any single image I can post.)

Enjoy.

I Imitate John Kerry. ...Damn.

2004-07-31T16:39:00.000Z

Blegh. Proof that navel gazing on the blog to a minimum.

I "see trees as the cathedrals of nature."

Senator John Kerry, 07/29/04

"...trees...trees...trees..."

Me, 07/29/04

Life Imitates SNL

2004-07-29T07:35:00.000Z

John Edwards is "the smartest, toughest, sweetest man I know."

Elizabeth Edwards, Democratic National Convention, 07/28/04

"I'm good enough, I'm smart enough and doggone it, people like me."

Stuart Smalley (Al Franken), Saturday Night Live

"Properly Pompous"

2004-07-29T06:07:00.000Z

That's how my friend Matthew reacted when I pitched out the name of my blog. I think the full line was, "Properly pompous....if fits you pefectly." A pithy pot calling the kettle char-broiled is what that was.

In any case, I think the new blog design fits really well. For me, it evokes ocean-ness. Someplace near a very large body of water. Somewhere with dirt under your toes and the scent of fresh cut grass in the air. A place with trees.

I haven't spent much time at either of the coasts, actually. In fact, I grew up in the Midwest. "Fly-over country," you might say. We were certainly lacking when it came to mountains, beaches, or sexy geographical features. The closest ski 'resort' was -- generously put -- a hill, in the middle of farmland. No, it wasn't the Rocky Mountains, but at least there were trees.

I've relocated, for work, to the Southwestern U.S. since college graduation. I live in the middle of a desert. Not the "Great American Desert." This is the real American desert: plants and birds and rocks and things, and a Horse With No Name.

Down here, trees go by a different name: Cactus. Yeah, check out that grove of 'trees' over to the left. They're cool, but at the end of the day, they're just prickly, waxy, overgrown green stumps. We have some other trees with strange green bark and small leaves (I'll try to photoblog them), but that's it.

Down here, trees -- oaks, maples, birch, aspen -- you know, REAL trees give some people a true sense of wonderment. One of my co-workers was going to visit relatives back home in Illinois, and I had to smile listening to him talk about the trip. He's a native of the area, so baked rocks and sharp stumps are all natural to him. But when he spoke, I heard the awe in his voice as he recalled the large acres of grass, the leafy giants of trees, and the green stuff all over the place. The best way I can describe it is to think of someone's reaction when they've seen the ocean for the first time. He just thought it was the coolest thing.

I miss the trees.

One of THOSE developers...

2004-07-28T07:18:00.000Z

I'm now a registered member on SourceForge. It's a cool community, and I'm interested in their massively distributed development management.

My descent into the realm of /.'ers has been rather quick. At work, I've been lured into the world of Open Source development. Well, sort of. I didn't exactly have a choice in the matter.

My development environment consists of Eclipse running on Red Hat 8 / KDE. The video card in my Dell box has some amazingly bad karma with RH. I inherited the setup from another guy, and everyone's afraid to change the config too much. Even the guy who's doing a clean install of Gentoo. Yeah -- FrankenTux, that's my box. And, for the final nail in the coffin, I'm not doing Mono development. I'm pure Java, baby.

As time allows, I'll get into some of my thoughts on migrating from the supremely glorious C#/VizStudio.NET combo to the utilitarian Linux dev environment. I'm starting to become dangerous in Linux, but boy...there are times when I have flashbacks for the good ol' days.

You win teh prize!

2004-07-27T08:23:00.000Z

If you're looking for this picture of ~~Captain Cleanroom~~ John Kerry...

...don't Google Image Search for "kerry spacesuit". You'll get this instead:

Under construction

2004-05-24T01:53:00.000Z

Thanks for your patience whilst I fiddle with the layout.

NASA's Proposed New Logo

2004-05-23T19:02:00.000Z

NASA's proposed a new logo, and I think it looks pretty snazzy. I hope the "Exploration" tagline and the Earth, Moon, and Mars spheres actually reflect a new philosophy at the agency. If it's just a PR move, I'm going to really bummed.

Proposed logo:

Current logo:

...Envy?

2004-05-12T01:24:00.000Z

MSNBC - U.S. to build world's fastest computer

It's comforting to a computer geek to know that the largest, fastest hunk of silicon in the world is going to be back in the U.S. Not that I'd ever have a chance to use it, anyhow.

"Frisbees near Fallujah"

2004-05-10T16:53:00.000Z

The Spirit of America Project I mentioned a while back:

"...They didn't know what to make of the frisbees at first, holding and throwing them like dinner plates, but once they had a little professional military education on how to operate the frisbee and were checked out on it, a lot of them became surprisingly good surprisingly quickly. I spent almost 45 minutes tossing the disc with one very young girl who got to be quite accomplished."

"Challenge Yourself"

2004-05-05T12:15:00.000Z

San Francisco Chronicle (via a friend):

Just when we thought we had a pure and simple hero, a millionaire athlete who gave up wealth and fame to become the ideal patriot, to make the ultimate sacrifice, his friends and family complicated everything. They turned Pat Tillman into a human being Monday, showing us what was really lost during that ambush in Afghanistan, insisting that we question every assumption we've made since he died an icon on April 22.

Yes, there were uplifting tales, moments when tears and pride swelled in everyone watching Tillman's memorial service at the San Jose Municipal Rose Garden. There were jarring moments, too, and they carried the message of the afternoon -- "challenge yourself" -- more powerfully than those laden with conventional inspiration.

Read it.

Studying for physics...

2004-05-04T18:27:00.000Z

I'm studying for a physics final over electromagnetism and optics, but my thoughts are elsewhere.

How's this for a future blog topic: "the social and economic future of the United States depends on our having an outward-looking foreign policy"? From a markets or national defense perspective, this wouldn't terribly interesting. I hope to raise a couple points that I haven't yet seen discussed.

John Kerry, the Ent?

2004-05-04T03:50:00.000Z

Due to technical difficulties, and what I imagine are bit-faries of the Democratic persuasion, my "John Kerry, the Ent?" post has been strangely deleted. (It's not outta the blue, it's just a technical glitch from last night finally resolving itself.) The full post shall return. ...After I take my finals tomorrow.

Until then,

Logical Proverbs

2004-05-04T03:44:00.000Z

(Have Your Cake) XOR (Eat Your Cake)

Applications of Economics Theory and Calculus at Spaghetti Works

2004-05-01T23:34:00.000Z

Between all the final projects due and test studying at the end of the year, I was able to have dinner with some friends at Spaghetti Works tonight. (You can skip to the Grand Unified Theory of Fettucine Chicken Alfredo Satisfaction equation, if you don't want to read all the fun math/econ stuff.

Spaghetti Works

I was checking out the price for my favorite dish, Fettucine Chicken Alfredo, and noticed something. You can order your pasta a la carte (fettucine noodles, alfredo sauce, topped with charbroiled chicken), or you can order "Fettucine Chicken Alfredo" as its own entree.

The prices are as follows:

A la carte: $9.99

Entree: $8.99

I should also mention that ordering a la carte entitles you to free refills of pasta and sauce.

The Economics

Ceteris Paribus, except for the unlimited pasta refills, this means that the present value (PV) of the future revenue stream (unlimited bowls of fettucine alfredo) is $1.00.

The Calculus

If you wanted to be really mathy about this too, we can find an equation for this:

Assumptions:

Diminishing returns on each bowl of pasta ( n ≥ 1 ).

Assume the price charged is the exact amount of "pasta satisfaction" (PS) you will receive from eating that dish.

Create a graph where x = n bowls of pasta, and y = the amount of PS per bowl (measured in dollars). Since we assumed diminishing returns, we will have a curve that asymptotically approaches the x-axis. Essentially, you will get no satisfaction from eating that million-billionth bowl of pasta.

We can deduce:

At x = 0, y is undefined. You're so hungry for that pasta you don't have yet, that the thought of fettucine chicken alfredo is supremely divine. (The curve asymptotically approaches the y-axis at this point.)

At x = 1, y is $8.99. From the Spaghetti Works menu, this is the price of a single bowl of fettucine chicken alfredo.

The integral (area under the curve) from x = 1 bowl of pasta to x = an infinite number of bowls of pasta is equal to $1.00. (Difference between unlimited bowls and a single bowl).

That means that Spaghetti Works expects you to get:

$0.50 enjoyment from the second bowl

$0.25 enjoyment from the third bowl

$0.125 enjoyment from the fourth bowl

...and so on...

For you numerical analysis folks out there, the diminishing returns curve is O(1/2^n).

Fettucine Chicken Alfredo Satisfaction

Putting it all together, the Grand Unified Theory of Fettucine Chicken Alfredo Satisfaction Curve (PSC) looks like this:

PS(n) = 8.99, 0 < n ≤ 1,

PS(n) = 8.99 + 1 / ( 2 ^ ( ⌈n⌉ -1 ) ), 1 < n ≤ ∞

where PS is your Pasta Satisfaction (dollars) and n is the amount of pasta consumed (bowls). We take the ceiling of n in the second piece of the function, because even if you only eat a fraction of the pasta in the bowl, you've still purchased the entire bowl of pasta.

Buyer's Remorse

2004-04-29T15:46:00.000Z

Blogger users were recently invited to sign-up for beta trials of Google's webmail service, Gmail. I did, and kept the screenname I've used ever since I had email. I wish I had tried to snag G-man@gmail.com.

You know the cafeteria food is going to suck when...

2004-04-29T15:22:00.000Z

...they advertise "choice of assorted beverages" on the menu, in place of an actual food item.

IMAO: Frank Suggestions to Improve John Kerry's Campaign

2004-04-29T02:55:00.000Z

Ways for John Kerry to improve his campaign:

"Things are looking pretty dour for John Kerry right now, and everything he does seems to make it worse. First there is his attempt to hold two simultaneous but conflicting positions like being for and against the war, for and against funding the troops, etc. He won't even need Bush for the Presidential debates; he could just do them Gollum style, making a statement, and then rebutting vehemently right after.
"We must fund the troops in Iraq!"

Camera angle on Kerry changes. "No! I hateses funding the nasty troopses!"
And now he's attacked Bush about his National Guard service - a story that played out months ago - after he said he was against such petty attacks. Really, presidential candidates are supposed to leave such sniping to subordinates; it's almost seeming like it's amateur hour at the Apollo with Kerry now..."

Read the entire post to find out the details of Frank's suggestions, which include:

Get Rid of the French-Lookingness

Stop Talking

No More Mentioning That You Served Vietnam

Pick a VP that Makes You Look Good in Comparison

Use Reverse Psychology

Wrestle a Bear

Keep Bill Clinton in His Place

Improve General Badassery

Frank concludes:

"So, Kerry, the choice is yours. You can either known as "John Kerry, the haughty, french-looking Massachusetts Democrat, who by the way served in Vietnam" or as "John F'n Kerry, badass loner of few words who's killed people and, by the way, wrestled a bear". Not much of choice, huh? I'd almost vote for you if you were the latter, except that I'm pretty sure you'd raise my taxes. By the way, I don't care if you wrestled a bear: if you raise my taxes, I kick your ass."

So much for target practice...

2004-04-28T01:14:00.000Z

Army tells ski resorts to give artillery back:

RENO, Nev. - The U.S. Army is demanding the return of five howitzers that two Sierra Nevada ski resorts use to prevent avalanches, saying it needs the guns for the fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.

A question for the ages...

2004-04-22T18:04:00.000Z

What is it about Earth Day that inspires crappy bands to come out of the woodwork and inflict their miserable noise upon college campi?

Democratic Humor II, or Flipper!

2004-04-21T22:22:00.000Z

John Kerry accused President Bush of "playing dirty" on the environment:

"He thinks that empty slogans like the 'Clear Skies' initiative and the 'Healthy Forest' initiative -- that somehow names that would make George Orwell rise up and cheer -- that those names will make people forget what is really happening in our country."

Almost on cue, a dolphin slipped through the water. "There he is over there,...He says, 'help, help, help."'

No, the misuse of the pronoun "he" isn't even the funny part, although President Bush is not the dolphin in the water. I'm trying to imagine the presumptive Democratic nominee spotting a dolphin and pulling off the line:

"There he is over there," Kerry said. "He says, 'help, help, help."'

Former President Clinton could've pulled it off seriously. President Bush would never have heard the end of it, if he did that. I think Mr. Kerry is unintentionally funny because he's trying so hard to pull of the Clinton and just bombing out terribly. I'll try to find an audio clip.

TabletPC

2004-04-20T20:07:00.000Z

I am now the proud owner of my very own TabletPC (finally!) I'll take some pictures in a bit and post my thoughts, but in the mean time Amazon has some goodies:

Product Details

Pictures

"Elegant" C# Code

2004-04-20T17:13:00.000Z

My girlfriend does not appreciate when I use words to describe computer stuff that would much better be applied to her. So, using the word "elegant" would've gotten me in trouble if I had written this headline: C# 2.0: Create Elegant Code with Anonymous Methods, Iterators, and Partial Classes -- MSDN Magazine, May 2004. But I didn't write it, so I think I'm safe quoting it. :)

Go ahead and read about the updates to C#. I'm still waiting for templates.

Aim Bot, I

2004-04-19T18:30:00.000Z

I've got a simple AIM bot up and running with Jaim. Add MotB0t to you buddy list, and send him an IP address.

Sample output:

MotB0t: .::Please wait while I look::.

MotB0t: I think that 202.37.96.62 is in: Christchurch, Canterbury, New Zealand

>>Click here for a list of blogs within 100 miles of Christchurch, Canterbury

Locational lookup from www.geobytes.com

"Callahan Moves Nebraska to the West Coast"

2004-04-19T18:03:00.000Z

Football is my favorite spectator sport. Ultimate frisbee is my hands-down favorite to play, but when it comes to cracking open a cold Diet Coke in autumn, the gridiron wins. Nebraska is my home state, so I've grown up with the scarlet and cream, Herbie Husker, and Go Big Red.

In my duties as a Husker fan, I would be remiss if I did not share this article from ESPN's Ivan Maisel about our coaching change, our new offense, and our spring game:

LINCOLN, Neb. -- I am ready for cats to lie with dogs. I am ready for a Cubs-Red Sox World Series. I am ready to see Michelle Wie in The Masters, Adam Sandler in Hamlet and Ralph Nader in the White House.

I have seen Nebraska shift to an empty backfield. I am ready to give snowballs a chance in hell...

On the first play, the Husker offense shifted from a two tight-end set into an I. Quarterback Joe Dailey faked a handoff into the line and threw deep. It may be the first time in recorded history that a home crowd ever cheered its offense for an incompletion.

"I was down in my stance," says guard Jake Anderson, a returning starter, "and when Joe called out the shift and we did it, you heard everybody in the stands go, 'Ooohhh.' I almost started laughing."

...This is a state where stooped 75-year-olds can spot a slow pulling guard from 40 rows up -- and so can their husbands. If anyone cares to write it, Nebraskans will storm their local Barnes & Noble for copies of West Coast Offense for Dummies.”

Yup, that's us. :)

Perl on WindowsXP

2004-04-18T23:26:00.000Z

If you want to run Perl on WindowsXP, get ActivePerl from ActiveState.com. The download link is in the top right corner.

Create an AIM bot

2004-04-18T22:11:00.000Z

I've been kicking around some thoughts that involve a programmable AIM bot. I did a little Googling and found an implementation for an Amazon.com AIM bot at O'Reilly's Amazon Hacks website.

But for any bot you write, you'll need some code that interfaces with the AOL servers. Here Net::AIM and Perl come to the rescue. The Net::AIM goodies are documented at the ActiveState Programmer Network. The developer's project page is here, and the source is at CPAN. To keep things equal opportunity, here's a straight-forward tutorial about creating MSN bots or AIM bots. Again, Perl is required. Unfortunately, it sounds like the MSN servers are not kind to bot buddies.

I think there's a lot of potential for messaging software that ties together IM, email, blogs, the works. For a rather nifty AIM service, get the latest news from WSJOnline. If that link doesn't work for you, send the message "news" (without the quotes) to the AIM user WSJOnline.

I'll post updates once I ever get around to playing with this stuff.

UPDATE: A Java implementation of the AOL TOC protocol is JaimLib (SourceForge).

Humanitarian Aid (and frisbees) in Iraq...from the Private Sector

2004-04-16T05:47:00.000Z

A Good Thing, from Daniel Henninger at the WSJ:

Over the past year, a successful technology entrepreneur named Jim Hake has been working with the Marine Corps to help their reconstruction projects in Iraq. The Marines identify local equipment needs, and Mr. Hake's organization, Spirit of America, after raising the money, acquires the stuff, typically for schools and medical clinics. It flies directly out of Camp Pendleton in California. Jim Hake and the Marines are a coalition of the can-do, bypassing the slow U.S. procurement bureaucracy.

I'm glad to see the private sector working good out in Iraq. Fundamentally, the Sprit of America's philosophy is this:

Jim Hake's organizational insight is to deploy the best practices of the modern U.S. economy--efficiency and speed--around the margins of the Iraqi war effort. The Amazons, Best Buys, FedExes and DHLs can get anything anywhere--fast. Why not use the same all-American skill at procurement efficiency and quick distribution to get the soldiers in Iraq (and Afghanistan) the stuff that government red tape will never provide in time?

And my favorite part:

Earlier projects for the Marines flew over cargo planes of school supplies, basic medical equipment and toys (turns out Iraqi children love Frisbees). [emphasis added]

From Spirit of America's blog:

Flying Discs (aka “Frisbees”): $11,230

15,000 flying discs (117g) imprinted with the word "Friendship" in Arabic and English. Vendor: The Print Box.

For more information about the humanitarian efforts, visit SpiritOfAmerica.net

Kilt-wearing Marine plays bagpipes in Fallujah

2004-04-16T04:39:00.000Z

An African-American Marine plays the traditional Scottish instrument in Iraq:

FALLUJAH, Iraq (AP) -- Amid the clatter of gunfire and explosions that regularly rock this city, an unexpected sound rises over the front line -- bagpipes.

Dressed in Marine fatigues with his gun at his side, 1st Sgt. Dwayne Farr, 36, blows into his set of pipes. The plaintive wail is carried by the wind that whips across this dust-blown, war-torn town.
(CNN)

I'm not sure you can get any more diversity than that.

Non sequitur?

2004-04-14T20:52:00.000Z

From the AP wire today:

Nudists Upset About Proposed Dorms

VANCOUVER, British Columbia - Beach bums here could receive far too much exposure if a proposed pair of high-rise dorms are built on the cliffs above a world-famous nude beach.

Aren't nude beaches essentially a legal form of public nudity? And now these people, who are publicly displaying themselves naked, are concerned about...being seen naked in public?

It's mean for the university to do," said Stephanie Gibson, 12, who has been raised in the buff on the beach. "I know they need more residences for the students, but they have to think of us."

University Vice President Dennis Pavlich said Monday that the university will keep the group's concerns in mind when designing the buildings.

If I were the university, I'd keep the nudity group in mind -- and think of the students living in the dorms. The students who are going to have a scenic view of underage people and grandparents and everyone else who feels like exposing their wares under the sun. There are just some things I don't understand.

Phew

2004-04-14T17:19:00.000Z

The Diet Coke machine is back.

That is all.

OB BS, I

2004-04-14T07:59:00.000Z

I'm currently taking a class on Organizational Behavior. I have a test tomorrow. My posting rate to this blog usually increases when I've got something like that coming up. Anyways, I have been reviewing the chapters, ready to pull out my hair for the longest time.

Unfortunately, I found a few gems that I wanted to share. The first, in a series:

"Although some unique tasks require specific mental abilities..., most jobs, including those of an accountant or interior designer, require general mental ability (GMA). (p. 303)

HOLY SMOKES! STOP THE PRESSES! NO SH...er, kiddin'? Do you mean to tell me that some form of magical "general mental ability (GMA)" is necessary to be employed?? Last I checked, GMA was known as HAPAIB -- Has A Pulse And Is Breathing!

Do we really need an acronym for that? It reminds me of the time that the term "eyeballing" was acronymized to 'ocular heuristic assessment' or 'OHA' in my business processes class. Oi vey.

And, why are we singling out accountants and interior designers? Is there something special about them, such that we need to reinforce the fact that they too, indeed, have their basic faculties? Since, according to Luthans, not ALL jobs require 'GMA', I would venture that 'university professor' is one of those distinguished professions that does not discriminate in any area.

For those of you keeping score at home, I'm using Organizational Behavior, Ninth Edition (Luthans). No, I DID NOT write the February 10th review. That said, the reviewer isn't wrong, either.

The Bermuda Triangle

2004-04-14T07:39:00.000Z

I'm a software engineer, but I haven't done a good job about writing about interesting technology stuff. So without further ado, a completely computer-focused post!

To fully appreciate what I'm about to expose to the world, you gotta recall this exchange between Rob Reiner and Tom Hanks from Sleepless in Seattle:

Jay (Reiner): What do they call it when everything intersects?
Sam Baldwin (Hanks): The Bermuda Triangle.

Our Bermuda Triangle is: FUD, the System/360 architecture, and The Mythical Man Month.

Point 1: The term FUD was coined by Gene Amdahl: "FUD is the fear, uncertainty, and doubt that IBM sales people instill in the minds of potential customers who might be considering Amdahl products." From Wikipedia.

Point 2: "Architecture of the IBM System/360 by G. M. Amdahl, G. A. Blaauw, F. P. Brooks, Jr."
From IBM Journal of Research and Development.

Point 3: The Mythical Man Month by Frederick P. Brooks, Jr.: "The classic book on the human elements of software engineering. Software tools and development environments may have changed in the 21 years since the first edition of this book, but the peculiarly nonlinear economies of scale in collaborative work and the nature of individuals and groups has not changed an epsilon. If you write code or depend upon those who do, get this book as soon as possible..." From Amazon.

If I wanted to be really evil, I'd mention Amdahl's Law to boot. But you computer people knew that already. Plus, we'd end up with the Bermuda Polygon. Ugh.

Nader's FUD

2004-04-13T16:57:00.000Z

On his website today, Ralph Nader writes:

The Pentagon is quietly recruiting new members to fill local draft boards, as the machinery for drafting a new generation of young Americans is being quietly put into place.

Young Americans need to know that a train is coming, and it could run over their generation in the same way that the Vietnam War devastated the lives of those who came of age in the sixties.

Since we haven't abolished the Selective Service Agency, it obviously needs to be staffed by someone. An article in today's Washington Times explains:

Rumors of a draft reinstatement emerged in the fall when the Selective Service announced that it was recruiting members for the nation's 2,000 local draft and appeals boards. A Selective Service spokesman said yesterday that the announcement was made to help fill spots on the boards, as many members' 20-year terms ended.

Now unless George W. Bush is an African-American Democratic Representative from New York, Nader's blowing smoke in the wrong direction. A year ago in January 2003, Rep. Charlie Rangel introduced a bill in Congress to reinstate the draft. I kid you not. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld responded:

"We're not going to re-implement a draft. There is no need for it at all," Rumsfeld said. "The disadvantages of using compulsion to bring into the armed forces the men and women needed are notable."

Finally, if you're concerned about minorities disproportionately serving in the Armed Services -- which was a very serious and legitimate concern in Vietnam -- and therefore suffering disproportionately higher combat casaulty rates, there's an interesting article over at National Review that you should just read as food for thought.

Mackubin Thomas Owens writes in The Color of Combat:

The fact is that blacks disproportionately serve in Army combat-service support units, not combat units. When Ricks wrote his piece, such units had become "majority minority," with more black soldiers than white. By contrast, he observed, the infantry, which generally suffers the most casualties in wartime, had become "whiter than America." African Americans constituted nine percent of the infantry, compared to 11.8 percent of the age eligible civilian population. In 1995, 79 percent of the new troopers were white, compared with 74.3 percent of civilians. There is little evidence to suggest that these figures have changed much over the last five years

Why is this the case? Ricks pointed out that the new demographics of the Army have to do with the dynamics of an all-volunteer force — Blacks and whites join the military for different reasons.

Essentially, white enlistees are "frequently looking for adventure while they try to raise money for college" and thus choose positions where they are more likely to see combat. In contrast, black enlistees "are generally seeking skills, and so gravitate toward administrative and technical jobs." Things to think about.

(From Wikipedia, FUD is an abbreviation for Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt).

KHAAANNNN!

2004-04-13T03:02:00.000Z

I can't think of a better bad guy death scene in a movie than in Star Trek: The Wrath of Khan

Khan: From hell's heart, I stab at thee. For hate's sake, I spit my last breath at thee.

The full scene is longer, and the dialogue is actually cribbed from Moby Dick, but it's good stuff.

As for good guys getting killed off, there are a few good choices out there. But really, what self-respecting Trekkie didn't want to cry when they first saw Spock sacrifice himself to save the Enterprise? :-P

Metric Time

2004-04-09T02:30:00.000Z

No self-respecting individual who has any scientific training should try and justify that the Standard System of measurement is easy. Inches, feet, miles, gallons, quarts, cups, and ounces make historical sense...sort of. Actually having to use them in daily life is a very small, but consistent, pet peeve of mine. Fortunately, I have an alternative: the metric system.

But even then, measuring time is screwed up. Flat-out funky. 24 hours per day. 60 minutes per hour. 60 seconds per minute. 1000 milliseconds in a second. ..Huh?? The numbers are all divisible by four, but that's about it. And they come in weird multiples. Not elegant all all. The world demanded my action, a better solution. The free peoples of Middle Earth had suffered long enough.

On a study abroad at Oxford, England (nothing like inspiration, eh?), my friend Jesse and I came up with the answer: metric time. Sadly, we were not yet plowed under by several pints o' Guinness. Not even ONE pint o' Guinness. We were stone-cold sober in International Economics. Yes, we are that cool in real life.

Metric time is as follows:

100 seconds / minute
100 minutes / hour
10 hours / day

A day would remain one revolution of the Earth: 23h 56m 4.1s in 'Standard System'.

See? It makes perfect sense. Admit it -- it IS pretty darn nifty once you get a chance to let it all soak in.

I did some rough, back-of-the-napkin-style calculations during the discussion about European Union farm subsidies and the admission of Poland into the EU. I lost those, but I recently discovered a guide to Metric Time which is thoroughly enlightening.

Enjoy!

Taxes

2004-04-06T06:00:00.000Z

It's that time of the year, again. The grass is greening, the weather is warming, the birds are chirping, and a young man's thoughts turn to...wondering where on God's green earth his tax money goes. Well, I take that back. I know where it goes, and I'm not thrilled at all.

Ravenwood goes into detail, so I'll just quote the beginning and the end:

"What do I get for my 35%? Well for starters, I get a social security system that I'll never use. Every year they send me statements that say that if I keep working my ass off, and live another 37 years I'll get a whopping $1100 a month. That's assuming they aren't broke, and there are still enough suckers paying into the system to give me my fair share. I'd be much better off sticking that money into a private account every month than paying into the government mandated ponzi scheme....

I would like to think that for all its worth, I at least get a government that protects my individual freedoms. But I don't. Instead I get a national, state, and local government that works to limit my speech, take away my guns, and search my house for no good reason. I also get a strong central government that constantly oversteps it's Constitutional authority and tries to run 280 million private lives from Washington. Each year government gets larger and more intrusive, and it seizes more of my money in exchange for votes from large blocks of sheep citizens. We're spending more and more money on failing programs, when we should be asking for our money back."

And for more fun, here's my personal tax story. I'll keep the math easy. My official residence is in State A, but I earned 99% of my income in State B over the summer. According to the tax tables for State B, I owe them $67 in personal income tax. So far, simple enough. Now, according to the bean counters in State A, I owe State A $100 in personal income tax -- for the money I earned in State B. So, the State A bean counters, generous souls that they are, allow me to subtract the $67 I paid State B from the $100 they say I owe State A. Here's the catch: I need to pay State A the 'other' $33 dollars in tax they've decide I owe.

It comes down to this: only 1% of my gross income came from State A, and they're demanding 33% of my tax!

An Arm and a Leg

2004-04-06T05:48:00.000Z

Cobb turned down a job at Google:

"Aside from that I was told that my database group, the financial database group would not necessarily rub shoulders with THE database group. Not that I wouldn't have bogarded anyway.

So the sword of Damocles hangs over my head as I bite my nails through the Google IPO. Was I right, or was I wrong? I hope I was right. This will be the second time. I turned down Microsoft over a little thing called Visual Basic back in 1991."

Ouch. ::cringe::

Republican Humor, III

2004-04-05T03:42:00.000Z

Starring: John Kerry, International Man of Mystery (requires Real Player, free)

The only similar thing I can find on the DNC's website is this crummy Flash ad.

I'm impressed. The RNC used humor, parody, and a bit of irreverance to poke fun at Mr. Kerry. Not too bad for a group of folks whom people want to write off as a bunch of old, stodgy white men in smoke-filled rooms. Sure it's not SNL-quality, but then again, SNL isn't SNL-quality either. The DNC -- which conventional wisdow says is in touch with the hip, irreverant MTV-generation -- completely drops the ball in their "ballooning the deficit" ad. I honestly hope they didn't pay money for it. If they did, Mr. Kerry should stay the heck away from the ad agency. Not only was it sanctimonious and boring, the message isn't clear.

First: Bush is ballooning the deficit (Notice the clever metaphor -- an inflating balloon. Wow.)
Then: Bush is cutting spending. On this program....and this program....and this program...and...."

Ok, ok. Bush is increasing the deficit...by cutting spending? My reaction was that the President should be applauded for dramatic spending cuts in the face of a "ballooning deficit," and yet that's a reason I should vote against him?

Republican Humor, II

2004-04-05T03:25:00.000Z

Available in red, white, and black, with or without the text from ThoseShirts.com ("Effing the ineffable since 1991"):

Comments and Traceback now available

2004-04-05T03:17:00.002Z

A comments and traceback system is now available, hosted for free by the fine folks at Haloscan.com.

Poisson d'Avril, RNC-style

2004-04-04T04:56:00.000Z

The RNC commercials are decently amusing. Moreso, I guess, since they're actually from the Republican National Community. When I think "sense of humor," the big elephant isn't the first thing that comes to mind.

Kerry Cousin Calls RNC to Support Bush

"Limericks, Stupidity, and Reality"

2004-03-08T01:44:00.000Z

I'm currently suffering at the whim of Hennessy & Patterson and their gift to the world of computer architecture (read the reviews).

...So I was looking for a limerick to use in my away message to describe the copious amounts of fun I'm having at the moment. I was unsuccessful, but my trusty sidekick Google found this gem: 'xml-dev - An Architecture for Limericks'. Check it out. I mean, who doesn't enjoy the beauty of a well-defined schema?

My Pet Fat

2004-03-05T08:16:00.000Z

Somehow the words on their website...

"mypetfatTM consists of a 1oz. replica of body fat and a set of thoughts that are called mind stretches. Together, they are the mypetfatTM program.

mypetfatTM is a way to think differently about weight loss that will create immediate, life changing results for your health.

more than a piece of fat, mypetfatTM will help you with the one and only thing that creates immediate, life changing results… your thinking."

...were different from what I read:

Tom Smykowski: It's a "Jump to Conclusions Mat". You see, you have this mat, with different CONCLUSIONS written on it that you could JUMP TO.
Michael Bolton: That is the worst idea I've ever heard.
Samir: Yes, this is horrible, this idea.

Back to the blogroll...

2004-03-05T07:53:00.000Z

Sorry, I got a little sidetracked. The short point:

I want to post some insightful, thought-provoking blog links. Humor and satire are welcomed, but not required. Is there someone you think I should link to? Email me.

Since we're talking about ye olde blogrolle, I'd like to point out a few new links:

Mullings
The cyber-column of Rich Galens, an American in Iraq. It's honest, personal writing from someone who's right there. Plus, he refers to himself as Ranger Rick.

Wonkette
"Politics and culture" from the Beltway. I don't read it terribly regularly, but it's always fun when I do. Bonus points for the cat in her masthead.

Diversity for a competitive advantage

2004-03-05T07:11:00.000Z

I'm trying to bring some diversity to my meager blogroll over there on the right. The problem is, in the muddled muck of the blogosphere, I haven't found anything that really jumps out at me. [Ed. Attempting to explain my position on diversity, things turn south and an 'affirmative action' post appears. You've been warned.]

A very intelligent, very rich man (who founded his own company, ran it successfully, cashed out for millions of dollars, gave millions away, and is now doing humanitarian work in Iraq -- a civilian, voluntarily away from his family for 4 - 6 months) once told me a key to running a successful company was thus: don't hire people like yourself. The ultimate goal of this is to shrink the number of 'unknown unknowns' as much as possible.

The theory is : if you only have people who are sufficiently similar to you in your employ, you WILL get tunnel vision. And once the blinders are on, you will miss key competitive opportunities. More importantly, you will miss key competitive threats -- companies, organizations, ideas that could ambush you and take out everything you have worked for.

I had never heard the case for "diversity" or "affirmative action" made this way before. I thought it was very interesting that the driving argument was not touchy-feely modern liberal rhetoric, but pure business paranoia. I like this argument. To me, there's too much (or, ALL, I guess) in the modern liberal / Democrat platform that's so incredibly Socialistic it makes my stomach turn. And while current AA policies may not be "quotas", strictly speaking, so often it seems that it walks like a duck and it talks like a duck.

The problem? People become entrenched in anti-AA (anti-quota) arguments, rather than focusing on the bigger picture -- maintaining diversity in your work environment is a healthy expression of business paranoia. The "business paranoia" view recognizes that everyone is doing their part to keep the business afloat -- identifying markets, defending against competitors, creating new products -- and are truly making a positive contribution to the organization.

The other flaw I see with current pro-AA arguments are that they treat people like tokens and ignores the value of their contributions. Generally, a goal of AA is that the (ethnic/gender/racial) representation in a company should be reflective of the industry demographic. For example, your 90% of the employees in your company are male and yet 70% of the available workforce in that industry is female. Should you hire more women? YES! ...To be in compliance? NO! ...You should hire more women because your business is too homogenous!

The purpose of workplace diversity should not be compliance: it should be attaining a competitive advantage.

Truth in advertising

2004-03-04T08:16:00.000Z

The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now is a national organization promoting the concept of a "living wage".

If you're creating a political organization and you want me to take you seriously...don't make it so easy for me to call your group "a bunch of nuts". I honestly wouldn't mind if you challenged my creativity. These "Association of Community..." folks are practically asking for it.

Hint: Write out the capital letters to find the group's acronym. Or, go to their website.

EDIT: On second glance, they were really trying to get that classification. The name would've made sense without "Now". In the immortal words of Dana Carvey as Tom Brokaw, "that's just superfluous."

No more spall chekking

2004-03-04T03:05:00.000Z

Spell check is banned at Dow Jones, says the New York Post:

EDITORS and reporters at Dow Jones newswires can no longer rely on SpellCheck to help them do their jobs. As of last night, the SpellCheck software program was banned at the world's largest financial newswire. In several memos distributed Monday, senior editor Neal Lipschutz noted: "We've had too many instances recently where editors and reporters using SpellCheck have inadvertently created errors in stories because names were changed. (Spitzer became Spit Fire, Medco began Medic, etc.).

So, we'll have to go back to the old-fashioned way - use a dictionary when you want to check a spelling."

On a side note, Dow Jones publishes the Wall Street Journal, whose editorial pages featured the word "eleemosynary" in one of today's columns. I think the spellchecker ban is proof positive that "eleemosynary" is some misfigured, bastardized word that was never intended to zap between human synapses.

I don't remember that part of the story...

2004-03-03T19:02:00.000Z

From the New Britain Herald:

"NEW BRITAIN -- A local woman with psychological problems purposely drove her car into the water at A.W. Stanley Quarter Park in an attempt to re-enact a scene from the blockbuster film, "The Passion of the Christ," police said....

Although police could not say which specific scene motivated the woman, they believe she was attempting to be baptized..."

Star Trek meets Harry Potter

2004-03-03T18:52:00.000Z

If the Delca Project pans out, the human-computer interface in 10 years will be tremendously improved.

From their website:

"The main concept of Delca is to create artifical intelligent assisting agents, with whom the user can fluently conversate and communicate."

Be sure to check out the Playground and the Spiritarium.

Perspective.

2004-03-03T18:39:00.000Z

...An Evil corporation? ::pinkie to lips::

2004-03-03T17:56:00.000Z

I am currently taking a course that requires I make semi-intelligent, articulate posts to the class website. The latest thread we're supposed to respond to:

Minimum Wages
The minimum wage began in 1938 at 25 cents per hour, and has grown over the years. However, research results are mixed as to whether an increasing minimum wage rate reduces job opportunities for lower skilled workers. Strong philosophical opinions have been expressed, supporting the importance of setting a "living wage" for humanitarian reasons, which suggests that we need an even higher minimum wage rate. Others believe that the market forces should determine equilibrium wage rates, and that free market capitalism is the only way to avoid the unemployment that results from artificially high minimum wages. What do you think and why?

I don't think this topic relates directly to the class, so I'm a little curious as to why the teacher chose it. Hopefully it will inspire some more thoughtful discussion on the class website than we've had so far. To this point, people have been competing to burp out their thoughts in the fewest amount of words:

::BURP:: International understanding is good!
::BRAWWWP:: I like people! ::BURP:: Sing Kumbaya!
::BURP BURP:: Technology is good, but also bad.
::URP:: Me, too!

Good heavens. Twas a bit of a colorful overshare.

Anyways. In the spirit of the latest topic, we watched a video in class of John Stossel's 20/20 report on sweatshops, globalization, and the granola nuts who come out for every WTO meeting. Even more of a stretch, but I won't complain about watching Mr. Stossel.

As I post to the class website, I'll cc: things here.

Wandering on the Web, We Wonder What Word Was Written

2004-03-03T08:23:00.000Z

I ran across "eleemosynary" while reading today's OpinionJournal.com editorial about George Soros.

Good heavens, I've heard that reading the NYT or WSJ is supposed to improve your vocabulary, but my poor little brain just splattered all over the inside of my cranium when I read that. Mr. Muravchik had a couple other choice phrases in there, but "eleemosynary" takes the cake.

Honestly, I thought it may have been a misprint. I can only see this word used in context when Sherlock Holmes just got a shot of novicane: "Eleemosynary my dear Watson!"

On the outside chance the Journal didn't pull the word from parts unknown, I Google'd it. I found the following definition:

eleemosynary \el-uh-MOS-uh-ner-ee\, adjective:
1. Of or for charity; charitable; as, "an eleemosynary institution."
2. Given in charity; having the nature of alms; as, "eleemosynary assistance."
3. Supported by or dependent on charity; as, "the eleemosynary poor."

I'd hate to get that word in a spelling bee. Look at the pronunciation: "ee" gets pronounced "uh". My 7th grade French teacher would've called that a 'false friend' word.

(And for you wordsmythes who want to cozy up to our friend of dubious character, the word was Dictionary.com's word of the day for May 14, 2003.)

1337|\|355

2004-03-02T00:33:00.000Z

Thanks to Luke for finding and posting the Jefferson quote on a forum that I read. He didn't know it would become the epigraph/title of my blog. Neither did I.

What I have in common with Bill Gates...

2004-03-01T23:10:00.000Z

Bill Gates is interviewed by News.com and captures my enjoyment of computer science:

"I dare Wall Street to come up with a demo for which they can say, "Hey, we will change your world and make it a better place, and you can help handicapped people." I dare a law firm or a bread company--these can be wonderful companies, don't get me wrong--to improve the world. Doing so today involves some mix of computer science applied to many domains and to biology."

I became interested in computers because, as a programmer, you can make it do anything. I've been accused of being OCD (guilty), so having complete and total control over this box with limitless possibilities was pretty cool. Once I hit the big time with GUI programming, it dawned on me that the implications of programming were much greater. I could make stuff that helped people be more efficient at their jobs, improved their quality of life, and do things they never thought possible.

But still, you ask, what's so great about computer science -- can't you do that in other fields? I say, yes you can, but

(Scope and Magnitude of your Impact) / (Your Unit of Work)

is far greater in computer science than anything else. To an extent, this is why I write a majority of my software on the Windows platform: they've got something like 95% end-user market share. Simply, I can have an impact on the most people. And, frankly, if you're running Linux....you're gonna write your own whiz-bam tool, code reuse be damned...or you'll refuse, on pure principal, to install something that a Windows code monkey like myself wrote. :)

...but I digress.

Gates also had some thoughts on outsourcing:

"The world is therefore tapping into more human skills and innovation, and the lower prices that come out of that will be great for everyone. The world is just better off. Some of these impoverished countries will now participate in the positive development cycle, and that is great for everyone.

The United States will have to ask, "What it is that we are going to continue to be the best at?" We have to rededicate ourselves to the importance of intellectual property and a better education system. In the 1980s, we had this angst about Japan--that it would just go after industry upon industry and take over. We can look back at that and say, "That was wrong." But it actually created a level of humility and a rededication to not just matching the Japanese model but emphasizing what was different and better in the United States, including our research universities."

Overall it's a pretty lengthy interview on state of computer science, outsourcing, and issues facing tech companies in the near and mid-term. Good stuff.

Offshore Outsourcing to India

2004-03-01T19:30:00.000Z

Thomas Friedman recently visited Indian labor-outsourcing operations, prepared to "denounce the whole thing." Instead, he found:

"All the computers are from Compaq. The basic software is from Microsoft. The phones are from Lucent. The air-conditioning is by Carrier, and even the bottled water is by Coke, because when it comes to drinking water in India, people want a trusted brand. On top of all this, Nagarajan said, 90 percent of the shares in 24/7 are owned by U.S. investors. This explains why, although the United States has lost some service jobs to India, total exports from U.S. companies to India have grown from $2.5 billion in 1990 to $4.1 billion in 2002."

Surprisingly, even animation (yes, the biggest Mickey Mouse job of all) is being sent to Bangalore! But in an interesting twist, the major Indian animation studio JadooWorks is creating its own movie about the life of Krishna. Friedman discovers that

"To write the script, though, it wanted the best storyteller it could find and ended up outsourcing the project to an Emmy Award-winning U.S. animation writer, Jeffrey Scott - for an Indian epic!
.
"We are also doing all the voices with American actors in Los Angeles," Kulkarni said. "And the music is being written in London..."

There's an article in this month's Business Week about the effects of outsourcing specifically on the software industry, and it's going to be painful at first. But, we can't expect to have free markets, open markets, or a 'global economy' if we're throwing up trade barriers right and left.

More to come later.

A first post

2004-03-01T18:38:00.000Z

I'm a computer scientist by training and a software engineer by trade, so it seems appropriate that my first few serious posts are about labor outsourcing and open-source software...