Friday, January 05, 2007
Congresswoman Praises Sports Teams for 5 Minutes
It turns out the first 100 hours starts on Monday. Right now Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC) just spoke for 5 full minutes on the Appalachian State Mountaineers victory over U Mass on December 15th to with their NCAA division and on Wake Forest Demon Deacon football team winning the ACC championship. It's like she read two sports articles from a newspaper. This is what we elect people to Congress for?
Time to Teach Civics in Kansas
It looks like we need to make sure they teach in Kansas not just evolution but also civics. Think Progress reports on newly elected Rep. Nancy Boyda (D-KS) saying she'd support a troop surge. I think that's a bad idea but her statements are worse than that. "I think we’re going to vote to support what the commander in chief and head of military asks to do." She also said that Bush is Commander in Chief and "Congress doesn’t make that decision". Apparently she doesn't understand our governement system at all or the separation of powers. Pretty frightening for a member of Congress. If they have to do what the President says, why does she think there's a Congress at all?
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Mars Rovers Learn Some New Tricks
In case you forgot, the Mars rovers are still running and it's been 3 years since their arrival. With a new software upgrade they should be able to do even more. It's all pretty amazing as they were just supposed to work for 90 days.
Bush Claims He Can Open Your Mail Without Warrant
So Bush is now claiming the power to read your mail without a warrant. I'm not surprised and that in and of itself is annoying.
There was a bit Postal Bill and Bush signed it in to law on December 20th and of course, issued a sigining statement. It sounds like many of the others he signed, I'm beginning to be able to recognize the trends. In places where the law sets minimum requirements on appointees (in this case, managing organizations of more than 50,000 people as opposed to say running horse shows). On such things Bush claims the law limits the pool of qualified candidates and he'll appoint who he wants since he's the "unitary executive". He's been so good at that so far.
In other places where he doesn't want to obey the law he just signed he'll write something like "The executive branch shall construe section xxx consistent with the President's constitutional authority to (supervise the unitary executive branch, conduct the Nation's foreign affairs, protect the nation).
As for opening your mail, he wrote: "The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection."
And for this kind of stuff it usually all comes down to the legal use of the word "exigent" vs say "emergency" or "imminent danger" or other terms that have specific differences in law as opposed to common usage, much like obscene vs. indecent. Still, this is just one more reason to dislike Bush.
There was a bit Postal Bill and Bush signed it in to law on December 20th and of course, issued a sigining statement. It sounds like many of the others he signed, I'm beginning to be able to recognize the trends. In places where the law sets minimum requirements on appointees (in this case, managing organizations of more than 50,000 people as opposed to say running horse shows). On such things Bush claims the law limits the pool of qualified candidates and he'll appoint who he wants since he's the "unitary executive". He's been so good at that so far.
In other places where he doesn't want to obey the law he just signed he'll write something like "The executive branch shall construe section xxx consistent with the President's constitutional authority to (supervise the unitary executive branch, conduct the Nation's foreign affairs, protect the nation).
As for opening your mail, he wrote: "The executive branch shall construe subsection 404(c) of title 39, as enacted by subsection 1010(e) of the Act, which provides for opening of an item of a class of mail otherwise sealed against inspection, in a manner consistent, to the maximum extent permissible, with the need to conduct searches in exigent circumstances, such as to protect human life and safety against hazardous materials, and the need for physical searches specifically authorized by law for foreign intelligence collection."
And for this kind of stuff it usually all comes down to the legal use of the word "exigent" vs say "emergency" or "imminent danger" or other terms that have specific differences in law as opposed to common usage, much like obscene vs. indecent. Still, this is just one more reason to dislike Bush.
Bring Your Grandchildren to Work Day
It's apparently Bring Your Grandchildren to Work Day. The members of the House have just been sworn and and Nancy Pelosi was elected Speaker of the House. Now at 1:41PM ET, CNN is showing a live shot on the House floor of Pelosi holding her infant grandson. Have you ever brought a baby to your first day of work? It doesn't seem particularly out-of-place as the whole House floor is filled with people milling about. Yep, they're getting right to work.
Apple Predictions
All the Mac sites are pointing to this article, What Jobs told me on the iPhone by a former Apple Sales Manager. It's a fun read about being in meetings with Steve Jobs and that he expects an iPhone to be announced next week but not a tablet mac.
Celebrity Patents
Someone's collected a list of Celebrity Patents. Most seem pretty lame and bizarre, particularly compared to Heddy Lamar's invention of frequency hopping for secret radio transmissions. This was ahead of it's time and not implemented until the 60s when the patent expired, but it was the basis for spread-spectrum technology used in modern cell phones and wifi devices.
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Bush to Democrats on Budget, Already Playing Games
Bush has already made some public statements about the budget. The Washington Post covers the numbers but the LA Times goes a little more into the politics. Of course Kieth Olbermann did a better job on this tonight, I'm sure the video will be posted soon.
So Bush now is talking about reducing the deficit and controling pork. I just don't know where to begin with this. Maybe with the fact that he inherited a surplus and turned it into the largest deficit in history. He did it complicitly with his own party in control of the Congress while they trotted out ridiculous pork and didn't even tell the Democrats where the meetings were. Bush did his part by never even including the war in the budget and never vetoing one spending bill (when Congress could even manage to pass one).
And what are Bush's solutions? Make the tax cuts permanent. The basic math says that means that less money will come to the government so the deficit will get worse. Really basic math is beyond this guy. Ok, so the theory is that will stimulate the economy and the more money generated will mean more taxes. But we've had 6 years of this and the worst deficit in history, when will they realize this doesn't work?
Oh and the other thing he needs is the line item veto. We've already established this as unconstitutional but that hasn't stopped him before. And it's moronic to be talking about it now. The Democrats haven't done anything about pork except to say they will suspend earmarks (what the Republicans have perfected for pork) in their first 100 hours in power.
Meanwhile the Democrats have to figure out if they want to affect actual change in the country which will involve compromising with the administration (the Senate is tight and Bush still needs to sign bills into laws). So will that make Bush look stronger? You know the Republicans will twist it into being weak on principles and fliip flopping. Personally I'd like to see compromise come back to government, but I've already seen articles from the left saying lets give them a dose of their own medicine. Ugh, I'm tired of this already.
So Bush now is talking about reducing the deficit and controling pork. I just don't know where to begin with this. Maybe with the fact that he inherited a surplus and turned it into the largest deficit in history. He did it complicitly with his own party in control of the Congress while they trotted out ridiculous pork and didn't even tell the Democrats where the meetings were. Bush did his part by never even including the war in the budget and never vetoing one spending bill (when Congress could even manage to pass one).
And what are Bush's solutions? Make the tax cuts permanent. The basic math says that means that less money will come to the government so the deficit will get worse. Really basic math is beyond this guy. Ok, so the theory is that will stimulate the economy and the more money generated will mean more taxes. But we've had 6 years of this and the worst deficit in history, when will they realize this doesn't work?
Oh and the other thing he needs is the line item veto. We've already established this as unconstitutional but that hasn't stopped him before. And it's moronic to be talking about it now. The Democrats haven't done anything about pork except to say they will suspend earmarks (what the Republicans have perfected for pork) in their first 100 hours in power.
Meanwhile the Democrats have to figure out if they want to affect actual change in the country which will involve compromising with the administration (the Senate is tight and Bush still needs to sign bills into laws). So will that make Bush look stronger? You know the Republicans will twist it into being weak on principles and fliip flopping. Personally I'd like to see compromise come back to government, but I've already seen articles from the left saying lets give them a dose of their own medicine. Ugh, I'm tired of this already.
Keith Olbermann Slams Bush's "Sacrifice"
Keith Olbermann on Bush's new Iraq Sacrifice Plan. watch it.
Bush's Empty Energy Promises
Remember in the State of the Union Bush said we needed to invest in new energy sources and reduce our "addiction" to oil? Ever wonder what he's done to enable this? The answer is not much. And apparently it's again going to be part of the State of the Union in a couple of weeks. Think Progress points out that this really isn't a difficult prediction, apparently it's been in every one of Bush's State of the Union speeches and our dependency is at an all time high. Now I know it will take a while, but if Bush was serious, maybe leading nuclear physicists wouldn't need to beg Google to invest in nuclear research.
Geeks Playing in Snow
You know you're a geek when you make "a life-sized bust of Alan Turing, the father of computing". Click for more images. I wonder if this was inspired by my favorite, Calvin's Snow Art.
Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Casey to Take the Blame for Iraq
The New York Times ran this article Chaos Overran Iraq Plan in ’06, Bush Team Says. Josh Marshall sums it up as Casey will be taking the fall.
The quote that resonated with me was Bush telling the commanders: "What I want to hear from you is how we’re going to win, not how we’re going to leave." This just shows me he's clueless. Repeat after me, there isn't a military solution, you need a political one. If it's not clear, you need politicians and diplomats to get a political solution, not soldiers (they get military solutions which as we said there isn't one). Ugh.
The quote that resonated with me was Bush telling the commanders: "What I want to hear from you is how we’re going to win, not how we’re going to leave." This just shows me he's clueless. Repeat after me, there isn't a military solution, you need a political one. If it's not clear, you need politicians and diplomats to get a political solution, not soldiers (they get military solutions which as we said there isn't one). Ugh.
Why I Want an iPhone
I'll admit, I'm really hoping to see Apple announce a cellphone soon. It's simple, I want a phone to be a good phone and to integrate phone technologies with my mac easily. Ok, so everyone want music integration too. If it behaved like an iPod Nano, I'd be fine with that. But I care mostly about the phone features, here's what i want:
A cool, easy-to-use design. The iPod changed everything with the touch-wheel and then the click-wheel. Maybe the phone will have a new input device. I really liked the scroll-wheel on my old Sony (now on Blackberries and other smart phones). I hope it will have a normal keypad but my guess is it will probably be hidden and hopefully not needed often.
It's a phone, I should be able to talk to it to do most of what I want it to do. I mostly like my RAZR's voice dialing. It's great that I don't have to record the names, it compares what I say to the text names in the address book. Unfortunately it usually asks me to confirm, "Did you say, call x @ home?"
I want it to sync with my Mac's Address Book wirelessly (probably via bluetooth). I want the picture I have in Address Book to be sync'ed to the phone and I want to see the picture when they call me (and when I call them). I don't need a crappy camera in the phone until I can do video conferencing a la iChat. If there is a camera, it better work with iPhoto. I also want Address Book to remember speed dial numbers and when contacts have multiple numbers, to preserve the order of the numbers, as well as personalized ringtones per contact.
I should be able to manually enter items on the phone, maybe it won't be much easier than what I can do today but I should be able to be out someplace and ask someone for their info and type it in, or take it from the caller id log. It would be cool to beam a vcard from another iPhone, but did anyone really do that with a Palm Pilot (I did it twice)?
I want it to sync my calendar and appointments with iCal, much as my iPod can. I want to see the schedule and I want configured alarms to go off. I don't need to be able to create new items on the phone, too many buttons required for that. But it would be nice to be able to delete an item and to create a place holder for a new item with a voice memo attached. When I sync it with my computer, have it create the new item in iCal and let me listen to the memo to be able to enter all the stuff with a full keyboard and links to attendees, etc.
In fact I want a good voice memo system so that when I get home I can copy the memos to the computer and integrate them my todos, like with the new todo service in Leopard.
It should work like phone, not requiring headphones, though it should work with them and I'd really like a speaker phone. And of course it should have decent battery life, I want to be able to go away for a weekend, keep the phone on and even use it a few time without recharging it. Ok, that would be great battery life, if I have to plug it in at night, it's ok.
I'm still waiting for a good video iPod, I can wait for full web access, email, GPS location, games, RSS readers, etc. I just want a device that's a good phone, a small mp3 player and has very simple organizer for contacts and appointments (mostly read-only with simple write capabilities). I don't really care about text messaging but I assume it has to have some basic capabilities for everyone else.
A cool, easy-to-use design. The iPod changed everything with the touch-wheel and then the click-wheel. Maybe the phone will have a new input device. I really liked the scroll-wheel on my old Sony (now on Blackberries and other smart phones). I hope it will have a normal keypad but my guess is it will probably be hidden and hopefully not needed often.
It's a phone, I should be able to talk to it to do most of what I want it to do. I mostly like my RAZR's voice dialing. It's great that I don't have to record the names, it compares what I say to the text names in the address book. Unfortunately it usually asks me to confirm, "Did you say, call x @ home?"
I want it to sync with my Mac's Address Book wirelessly (probably via bluetooth). I want the picture I have in Address Book to be sync'ed to the phone and I want to see the picture when they call me (and when I call them). I don't need a crappy camera in the phone until I can do video conferencing a la iChat. If there is a camera, it better work with iPhoto. I also want Address Book to remember speed dial numbers and when contacts have multiple numbers, to preserve the order of the numbers, as well as personalized ringtones per contact.
I should be able to manually enter items on the phone, maybe it won't be much easier than what I can do today but I should be able to be out someplace and ask someone for their info and type it in, or take it from the caller id log. It would be cool to beam a vcard from another iPhone, but did anyone really do that with a Palm Pilot (I did it twice)?
I want it to sync my calendar and appointments with iCal, much as my iPod can. I want to see the schedule and I want configured alarms to go off. I don't need to be able to create new items on the phone, too many buttons required for that. But it would be nice to be able to delete an item and to create a place holder for a new item with a voice memo attached. When I sync it with my computer, have it create the new item in iCal and let me listen to the memo to be able to enter all the stuff with a full keyboard and links to attendees, etc.
In fact I want a good voice memo system so that when I get home I can copy the memos to the computer and integrate them my todos, like with the new todo service in Leopard.
It should work like phone, not requiring headphones, though it should work with them and I'd really like a speaker phone. And of course it should have decent battery life, I want to be able to go away for a weekend, keep the phone on and even use it a few time without recharging it. Ok, that would be great battery life, if I have to plug it in at night, it's ok.
I'm still waiting for a good video iPod, I can wait for full web access, email, GPS location, games, RSS readers, etc. I just want a device that's a good phone, a small mp3 player and has very simple organizer for contacts and appointments (mostly read-only with simple write capabilities). I don't really care about text messaging but I assume it has to have some basic capabilities for everyone else.
Roberts Reshaping the Court Slowly
Here's another article on John Roberts and the Supreme Court: A Matter of Degrees: John Roberts is Taking His Time to Reshape the High Court.
Republicans Hoping Democrats Won't Act Like Them
Now it will be the Republican's turn as the minority party in the House. They have already sent a letter to the Dems hoping they will approve a minority party Bill of Rights. This idea came from the Dems originally when Nanci Pelosi sent it to the Republicans in 2004. I guess the idea is that since it's Pelosi's idea, she should support it. Their letter leaves out the Republican response in 2004, because they didn't even reply to it.
Of course we'll see if the Dems are better at allowing the minority a voice than the Republicans were. It seesm that for the first 100 hours they won't. I'm not upset by this.
Of course we'll see if the Dems are better at allowing the minority a voice than the Republicans were. It seesm that for the first 100 hours they won't. I'm not upset by this.
Second Coming in 2007?!?!?
Yet again I agree with Cenk Uygur, 25% of the Country is Certifiably Insane. He rants after reading an AP Poll that among other things found, "25% anticipate the second coming of Jesus Christ" in 2007.
35% think the draft will come back and 35% predict a cure for cancer will be found. Apparently a third of the country doesn't understand that most cancers are very different from each other and it's unlike a single cure will affect all of them, maybe some, but not all. Oh and 70% "expects worsening global warming" but apparently they don't work in the Bush administration.
35% think the draft will come back and 35% predict a cure for cancer will be found. Apparently a third of the country doesn't understand that most cancers are very different from each other and it's unlike a single cure will affect all of them, maybe some, but not all. Oh and 70% "expects worsening global warming" but apparently they don't work in the Bush administration.
Roberts Highlights Judical Pay
Chief Justice Roberts devoted his entire 2006 Year-End Report on the Federal Judiciary to one issue, raising Judical pay. He says this "has now reached the level of a constitutional crisis."
"Congress has not acted on judicial pay for 2007, so for now salaries remain at their 2006 levels. That means Roberts will continue to be paid $212,100 a year, with associate Supreme Court justices at $203,000, appeals court judges at $175,100 and federal district judges at $165,200."
By today's standards those numbers are a good salary but not enormous. Still it's hard to argue that these people can't have a good quality of life. I've yet to see a description of their benefit plans and there is that little nicety of lifetime employment. And to be a federal judge, they've probably been employeed at one of the high paying jobs Roberts compares them to.
Matthew J. Franck has not been convinced by Robert's arguments. He claims Robert's cherry picked his years of comparison, choosing a time when judges were particularly overpaid.
Oh and so far the Supreme Court has issued only six opinions this term compared with 13 by this point in the last term. SCOTUSBlog has some further thoughts on the docket. This New York Times article from early December is particularly good on the topic, suggesting perhaps there is less for them to be doing.
"Congress has not acted on judicial pay for 2007, so for now salaries remain at their 2006 levels. That means Roberts will continue to be paid $212,100 a year, with associate Supreme Court justices at $203,000, appeals court judges at $175,100 and federal district judges at $165,200."
By today's standards those numbers are a good salary but not enormous. Still it's hard to argue that these people can't have a good quality of life. I've yet to see a description of their benefit plans and there is that little nicety of lifetime employment. And to be a federal judge, they've probably been employeed at one of the high paying jobs Roberts compares them to.
Matthew J. Franck has not been convinced by Robert's arguments. He claims Robert's cherry picked his years of comparison, choosing a time when judges were particularly overpaid.
Oh and so far the Supreme Court has issued only six opinions this term compared with 13 by this point in the last term. SCOTUSBlog has some further thoughts on the docket. This New York Times article from early December is particularly good on the topic, suggesting perhaps there is less for them to be doing.
Monday, January 01, 2007
Tournament of Roses Parade
I had forgotten about the parade this morning. I seem to only remember the Thanksgiving Day parade, maybe it has to do with having grown up in New York. A friend sent email saying it was particularly good when viewed in HDTV. DiscoveryHD is showing it now so I started watching.
The theme this year is "Our Good Nature" and it opened with a musical number with dancers and a band in front of a float of trees and shrubs. Kristin Chenoweth led the singing of the song who's chorus was "Celebrate our good nature". As soon as the song ended they cut to a flyover of a B2 "Spirit" Stealth Bomber with two F22 raptor fighters as escort. The announcers were gushing and practically speechless able to utter only "look at that". "wow", "ooooo". After they went by one said "Oh my gosh, there's not much you can say after that, wow".
Celebrate our good nature with a stealth bomber, riiiiiight.
I have seen a stealth fighter fly overhead in practice before a local air show and it was very cool. But we weren't singing or even talking about "our good nature" more like our technical or military ability.
Update: The parade was good. Highlights include:
The theme this year is "Our Good Nature" and it opened with a musical number with dancers and a band in front of a float of trees and shrubs. Kristin Chenoweth led the singing of the song who's chorus was "Celebrate our good nature". As soon as the song ended they cut to a flyover of a B2 "Spirit" Stealth Bomber with two F22 raptor fighters as escort. The announcers were gushing and practically speechless able to utter only "look at that". "wow", "ooooo". After they went by one said "Oh my gosh, there's not much you can say after that, wow".
Celebrate our good nature with a stealth bomber, riiiiiight.
I have seen a stealth fighter fly overhead in practice before a local air show and it was very cool. But we weren't singing or even talking about "our good nature" more like our technical or military ability.
Update: The parade was good. Highlights include:
- the Honda float with dragons that breathed real fire
- a Star Wars float with Ewoks on Endor, Darth Vader, Boba Fett, and band with marching stormtroopers, Empire musicians and dancing green slave girls. (again, why choose to dress as the dark side for a parade "celebrating our good nature"), ok there was another float of Naboo and I learned the capital city is called Theed
- Katherine McPhee seemed to have an Ashlee Simpson SNL-incident
- A guy flew with a jet pack off a float called Oklahoma Rising and down the parade route, I want one
Movie Review: Volver
There are very few men in Volver, and those that are there don't last long. Pedro Almodóvar has made a woman's film, about sisterhood.
Penélope Cruz is great as a woman trying to raise her teenage daughter, help her sister and her senile aunt as well as a friend with cancer. Her mother's ghost has returned and as if there isn't enough going on, Cruz covertly takes over the restaurant for sale next door. Even though it involves some extraordinary and even supernatural events, it's really about the daily lives in a small Spanish town. It's not (quite) a romp or a dark comedy but it's really pleasant visiting these people and rooting for them.
Go see this, it even uses the the music from Psycho appropriately.
Penélope Cruz is great as a woman trying to raise her teenage daughter, help her sister and her senile aunt as well as a friend with cancer. Her mother's ghost has returned and as if there isn't enough going on, Cruz covertly takes over the restaurant for sale next door. Even though it involves some extraordinary and even supernatural events, it's really about the daily lives in a small Spanish town. It's not (quite) a romp or a dark comedy but it's really pleasant visiting these people and rooting for them.
Go see this, it even uses the the music from Psycho appropriately.
Movie Review: Notes on a Scandal
Fatal Attraction as done by Masterpiece Theater. It's a stretch and far tamer in this film, but there's even a bunny analog. Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett are both potential oscar nominees.
The narative device is Judi Dench writing in her diary. She's a self-described old battle axe of history teacher and Blanchett is a new art teacher in the school. A friendship forms between them and then it gets strange. Blanchett is having an affair with a male student and Dench believes she can win Blanchett's heart. It was well done but for whatever reason I wasn't particularly enaged.
The narative device is Judi Dench writing in her diary. She's a self-described old battle axe of history teacher and Blanchett is a new art teacher in the school. A friendship forms between them and then it gets strange. Blanchett is having an affair with a male student and Dench believes she can win Blanchett's heart. It was well done but for whatever reason I wasn't particularly enaged.
Dolphin Boat
"It looks like something from a James Bond film. Shaped exactly like a dolphin, this boat is the latest toy for millionaire adrenaline junkies. The Seabreacher can jump 10 feet in the air and even perform acrobatic tricks."
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