Now that's a cat!

News from Iraq

This is funny. It had me going for the first 30 seconds...

It's Homer!

OH...MY...GOD! It's Homer.

Global Warming

HBO did a 4 part series called "Too Hot not to Handle." It was a special documentary on global warming. They offered it free on the iTunes Music store.

I highly recommend you view this video series. All four videos total about an hour of time. It's quite an eye opener. People think global warming is some theoretical phenomenon that we're trying to deal with proactively. This series shows several examples and cites statistics that demonstrate that global warming is affecting our lives today. And it will only get worse.

They've shown comparison photos of receeding glaciers in Alaska and the Antarctic. They showed how coastal cities along the east coast of the US have to occasionally dump new sand on the beaches to counteract the rising sea levels. They talk about the abnormally high number of hurricanes in recent years and they attribute this to global warming.

Is this guy stupid or what?

You know, some people are just stupid. Isn't there enough confusion in the world.

So, check it out. This guy Keith Dennis is the president of the dealership and, in his infinite wisdom, has come about this marketing strategy:

This is an excerpt of the article:
"A car dealership's planned radio advertisement that declared "a jihad on the automotive market" has drawn sharp criticism for its content but will not be changed, the business said Saturday.

Several stations rejected the Dennis Mitsubishi spot, which says sales representatives wearing "burqas" — head-to-toe traditional dress for Islamic women — will sell vehicles that can "comfortably seat 12 jihadists in the back.

"Our prices are lower than the evildoers' every day. Just ask the pope!" the ad says. "Friday is fatwa Friday, with free rubber swords for the kiddies.""

See the full article: Car Dealership Decried for Jihad Ad

I don't even think this guy (come on, his name is Keith Dennis) is Muslim. He has no clue what he's talking about.

Why can't there be more people in the world like the Dalai Lama...

He's figured it out...now we just need to hope he can teach the rest of us before it's too late.

The article from the Dayton Daily News:

Dalai Lama Urges Compassion, Love

The title seems a little corny, but read the article. He's talking about the violence in the world, in particular (but not exclusively) between the US and the Islamic people since the WTC attacks.

He's right, The world is globalizing. Communications is global, the economy is global, the Internet is global. We need to start thinking globally and stop treating each other like 'foreigners.'

In the article, he's quoted as urging "tolerance and understanding." On this point, I disagree. By seeking tolerance, he's suggesting that there's something to tolerate. I say we're all equal and the only thing there is to understand is that we all have a right to live our lives the way we see fit without the fear that someone will disagree with our beliefs and bomb our church or grocery store for it.

Bolivian President...Wow!

I get a podcast called Democracy Now. Today, Amy Goodman interviewed the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales. This guy's got his act together. For example:

• When elected, he cut his salary and the salary of his senior staff in half and redirected those funds back into health and education.
  
• He had a $1,000,000 campaign fund for his election. he spent less than half of that and returned the rest.
• He campaigned on 9 points, essentially making 9 promises to his constituents. He's already achieved 6 of them

He just seems like an amazing leader. I wish he could mentor our President. I think Bush could stand to learn a thing or two from Mr. Morales.

Follow this link to view the transcript of the interview or access an audio of the interview. This guy is impressive.

Bolivian President Evo Morales on Latin America, U.S. Foreign Policy and the Role of the Indigenous People of Bolivia

If you're looking for good, in depth news coverage on current events topics that attempts to consider alternate perspectives, I'd highly recommend Democracy Now. I get a daily podcast, but there's a website that can be viewed and it looks like they offer RSS headlines also. Great stuff. Check it out. www.democracynow.org

Starbucks raising prices

Found this article on Digg . here's a link to it:
Starbucks Raises Prices of Coffee Drinks

Lots of people pissing and moaning over it. I don't get it. Starbucks is an expensive cup of coffee. It always has been and always will be. They're entitled to make a profit and will raise their prices to whatever they think the market will bear. It's up to us to decide whether or not to pay it.

I think it's damned good coffee. I'll pay the new prices.

Middle East -- Iran

So, we've just paid Isreal to decimate Lebanon. Now we're trying to start a war with Iran. Iran's willing to talk to us, but we won't talk to them unless they quit their enrichment activities first. Iran wants to talk before they suspend activities. I don't get it. Bush is acting like a baby fighting over his favorite toy.

We've been in Iraq for, what, three years; Afghanastan nearly that long. We have so many troops over there now (nearly 140,000), how can we wage war on so many fronts. We're already recalling inactive reserves. How much more thinly can we spread our troops out.

BTW, I have a nephew in the Army (Airborne, I think). He's been there for one tour. They're thinking of sending him back. Not his first pick of duty station, if I recall.

Russian Climber

This guy is sick:

The video's a little long, but it's pretty amazing:

More iTunes Woes!

A couple of days ago, I talked about the problems I've been having with my iPod since updating the software. Long story short, I had to back out the update and run with the previous versions. Today, I attempted to sync with iTunes and received an error: "iTunes cannot transfer some files to your iPod because your sofware is too old." I was then directed to the Apple site to download the new version of iTunes.

Seems they're going to force users to upgrade to a buggy software. I'm holding off. I have something like 15GB worth of music and more than 30GB of video. If iTunes wants to hold back a few songs, I'd likely not even miss it.

iTunes is pissing off a lot of people. This market is really heating up and they can't afford to alienate their user base.

Osama Bin Laden

A poem I found. Wish I could give credit, but I don't know where it came from:

Osama Bin Laden, your time is short;
We'd rather you die, than come to court.
Why are you hiding if it was in God's name?

You're just a punk with a turban; a pathetic shame.

I have a question, about your theory and laws;
"How come you never die for the cause?"

Is it because you're a coward who counts on others?
Well, here in America, we stand by our brothers.

As is usual, you failed in your mission;
If you expected pure chaos, you can keep on wishing
Americans are now focused and stronger than ever;
Your death has become our next endeavor.

What you tried to kill, doesn't live in our walls;
It's not in buildings or shopping malls.

If all of our structures came crashing down;
It would still be there, safe and sound.

Because pride and courage can't be destroyed;
Even if the towers leave a deep void.

We'll band together and fill the holes
We'll bury our dead and bless their souls.

But then our energy will focus on you;
And you'll feel the wrath of the
Red, White and Blue.

So slither and hide like a snake in the grass;
Because America's coming to
kick your ***

Blogging and Podcasts

I just learned how to create a podcast from a CNet podcast called The Real Deal. One of the requirements is a blog to post links to the hosted MP3 files. This is my first real blog entry. I'll attempt to record a podcast in the next few days and will post a link to it here.

I don't have any idea what I'll say, but I'll come up with something.

Skype

I downloaded Skype tonight. It's use is pretty rampant on the 'net recently. I'll give it a try and let you all know how it is.

iTunes Fiasco

OK. I'm pretty much tied to my iPod all day every day. I'm a huge music buff, but when I got into this iPod phenomenon, I learned about podcasts and have been addicted.

Recently, Apple released the new version of iTunes, Version 7. I upgraded and allowed it to upgrade the iPod firmware to 1.2 also. This was the biggest mistake I could have made. It upgraded fine, but suddenly I had trouble getting podcasts to work. Some would work and others wouldn't.

It wasn't a podcast thing, because I've been subscribed to some of these for months. It wasn't a hardware thing, because it was fine just hours earlier and, even now, would play music files without any problems. It had to be the sofware update.

I went to the Apple Forums to see if anyone had experienced anything like this or come up with a solution to the problem I was having. Not only had no one posted a workable solution, but this problem and many others were very widespread. It's all over the net about the problems people are having.

So, long story short (too late, I guess), I had to back out the update and revert back to the old version and firmware. This process is somewhat tricky. If anyone's interested, I can post the details on how to do this.

I like some of the features of the new update, so I hope they fix it soon. However, they're not so compelling as to want to deal with the technical issues to enjoy them.

Stargate SG-1

I just found out last week that they're cancelling SG-1 on me. I'm bummed. The show's not quite a good with Richard Dean Anderson gone, but I still liked it. I liked Ben Browder from the Farscape days and I think he's doing fine here.

I've still got Atlantis, but STG-1 leaving is a big dissapointment.