I was stoked at work while watching Fox News last night (for a short period of time)...

The Libertarian Party (and the Badnarik/Campagna campaign) has raised enough dough to start doing nationwide ads. I caught one on Fox News last night. I'm sure it won't sway the race much, but hopefully it might stir some of Fox's conservative viewers to think about Dubya's brand of conservatism. A lot of conservatives often wonder about the Libertarian stance on the "war on drugs" and support for things like gay marriage. They view that as liberal. I beg to differ. The Libertarian stance is ultra-conservative. If it doesn't violate someone else's right to life, liberty, or the pursuit of happiness, there's a lot of activity that's protected by the Constitution. I suppose the "pursuit of happiness" part of things has a lot of wiggle-room.

Locally, some members of the QC Badnarik in 2004 meetup group did some banner-waving action at a busy QC intersection this morning. I believe they are planning on doing it next weekend. I'm glad to hear it because there was not a chance in hell that I could make it this morning. Honk if you love liberty!

Suzanne might want to kick my butt for saying it, but it's a rousing song from that new satirical movie...

"America! Fuck Yeah!"

Yes, we went and saw the latest sacrilege from the guys who brought South Park into the world. This movie is extraordinarily vulgar (surprise), so if that's not your cup of tea, you're best served by skipping it. If you can look past the raunchy side of things, this movie approaches hilarity defined. I've gathered that a lot of people don't think this made as much fun of "right wing nut jobs" as it poked "liberal wieners" in the eye. I see it differently. The over-the-top absurdity of the "heroes" in this flick is the finger pointed at the neo-con types. Again, if you can look past the "naughty" parts of this movie (and there are plenty), you might get a laugh.

Now for raunchiness of a different sort...

I checked my Yahoo! mail right before I went to sleep this morning and the Bulk box was empty. When we got home a little after five, there were 23 new junk messages. See? What a crock of crap!

Surprise, surprise!

11 days! Don't forget to go vote!

What's new and exciting here?

To be bluntly honest, not a whole lot! Suzanne's working for a bit tomorrow and I'm prepping myself for the vamp shift. I actually like working the midnight hours because I frequently find myself (especially when I'm off for six days) staying up at night anyway. Perhaps I'm a vampire...nahh!

I'm hoping that Suzanne will find out that she'll be able to return to a Monday-Friday shift tomorrow. That way, we'll be able to go see Team America: World Police. Seeing it while I'm working nights will be too much of a pain in the arse.

There is some exciting stuff going on in Bamaland. Congratulations!

I like to know things in the context in which they happened...

One reason is that the politicians of the world seem to like to distort things a little. The earliest reference I can find to this year's flu vaccine issues is from late August. Chiron said there were issues but they expected to be able to make up for it by early October. I'm willing to bet that our government took that announcement at face value. This issue isn't quite as easy as certain candidates for President are trying to make it seem. Anything to raise the Nov. 2 tally...

The contamination (I'm sure that you well-read people out there already know this) in this batch of vaccine was Serratia marcescens. I find it interesting that our government used it for bio-weapons research and presumably caused a drastic increase in pneumonia and urinary tract infections in and around the San Fran Bay Area in the 1950s. More on that can be found here.

Our bank offers downloadable account transaction records in three different formats. One of them is Excel. I don't have Excel on my laptop (I do have Open Office). Every time I was attempting to download a spreadsheet, IE crashed. I figured Open Office might automatically take care of it. I forgot to tell Windows to use Open Office to open .xls files. Another way to go about things is to download one (or more) of the MS Office file viewers from here. I downloaded the viewer and changed all associations to use Open Office. It's not that the viewers don't work. I just want to be able to manipulate the data and the viewers only let you look.

Addition to earlier gack...

We can also support our military men and women while asking the idiot politicians here at home what the hell they are doing sending troops to a hotbed like Iraq without enough vital equipment. Take that to heart, Henry Hyde. Yes, I am on one side. I call it the American side. I don't know what these buffoons are thinking when they suggest that criticism of the war or policies that led to it are unpatriotic or that the criticism gives the enemy aid and comfort. I actually do know what they are thinking, but they are wrong. Henry Hyde... you and your ilk can kindly kiss my ass.

If this is true, I might be screwed...

Is it bad to drink nearly a gallon of coffee every day?

I haven't talked much about the unit in Iraq that refused to perform a mission. Sometimes, risk just comes with the territory. However, I find it appalling that three years into the "war on terror" and a year and a half into the Iraqi excursion, troops aren't supplied with the best equipment. When does it become obvious that something more drastic needs to be done because even the leaders on the ground (and the people in Congress) know that things could be made safer? Families (or the soldiers guarding privately contracted individuals who make significantly more than they do) shouldn't have to buy their own body armor. Granted, John Kerry could have voted for the 87 billion after he voted for it, but we can't afford to be half-ass supporting our troops when they are fighting for the freedom of other countries. I'm still of the opinion that it isn't the job of our soldiers be freeing other countries.

Some blame must be placed on Kerry and all the others who voted yes (and are now bitching about the war) and essentially gave away their Constitutionally mandated power to declare war.

Rather than believe that the sky is falling because of a flu vaccine shortage, get the facts. It is bullshit that our supply is low but it's not the end of the world and it's not necessarily the fault of either of the two biggest BSers in this campaign. This whole flu thing did lead to John Edwards asking a funny rhetorical question... "And he couldn’t even manage this latest flu vaccine crisis. How can we trust him to deal with anthrax?" Nice. You still don't have my vote John Edwards, but that was hilarious. The Kerry-Edwards ticket couldn't do much better.

Sellam Ismail was on The Screen Savers this evening. He's responsible for this and this. That inspired me to seek out vintage public access systems accessible via the net. First and foremost, I can't say how cool SDF is. There are others. I just found the Deathrow OpenVMS cluster. Interesting...

Damn, I just thought about something...

I won't have much to bitch about after this campaign season is over. PSYCH! That's poppycock. Old Ron Northcutt stated it better. He would've said, "Auwww hell, that's horsesheeit!" Either of the two likely victors of November 2nd should keep my bitch session in progress for at least four more years.

What do we have here (PDF document)? Yes, it's another victory for free speech and freedom from unreasonable search and seizure. I have a feeling that the more controversial portions of the Patriot Act will be dying a slow death over the next couple of years. Of course, there will be people trying to convince us that everything about Patriot is benign.

Perusing through a few blogs this evening (actually found at one in particular), I found this political test. Yeah, it's a front for a dating site, but I figured what the hell! Care to hear how I was described? I did take it a second time because I didn't think to mention how it described me earlier. Oddly enough, it said that I was a Libertarian the first time. The second time....

"You are a

Social Liberal
(88% permissive)

and an...

Economic Conservative
(93% permissive)

You are best described as a:

Anarchist

You exhibit a very well-developed sense of Right and Wrong and believe in economic fairness."

Hmmmmm.....

Gotta love those 12-hour days...

Actually, I like them and I hate them. I adore them because they afford me and my homies at work the chance to have a six-day stretch off. When I'm working them, I am sometimes less than fond of them because Suzanne works during the day and I don't get home until around 7 PM. At least the 12-hour days beat the 12-hour nights.

We just had time to eat dinner this evening and go fetch some ice. While we were eating (and when we got back from fetching), I saw one of the scariest reminders that we are indeed growing older. I tried to avert my eyes from Growing Pains: Return of the Seavers as much as possible.

The election season is nearly over and I'm tired of it. I'm also tired of the latest controversy (Kerry's example using Darth Cheney's daughter). Yes, it was a politically inspired barb. It may or may not have been planned. However, if the Grand Uniter and friends weren't so hell-bent on passing an amendment designed to deny a certain group of people freedom to live as they choose (at no harm to others), we wouldn't be having this little problem. My marriage isn't threatened by this. What's next, a federal marriage license?

Hahaha! Save for traveling, I currently have no use for a cell phone. Suzanne has one and we use it when we are traveling. The only problem I could see with this is if someone had an emergency call or was waiting for an important call. However, don't most modern cell phones have a "vibrate" feature? Our father...[ring-ring-ring], who art in Heaven, [opening chords of Beethoven's Fifth]...hallowed be thy [insert your own ring tone here] name...

I don't get spyware on my home machines. I can't say the same about some of our machines at work. I don't know if it's just irresponsible clicking, lack of attention, or stupid downloading habits, but one machine was swamped. Fortunately, I was able to de-louse the 'puter in question. I'm sure it will be bogged down again soon. The odd thing is that the AV solution that my company uses says it protects against some of the programs that were present. I firmly believe that in most cases, the user will remain the weakest link. Tech will be part of the solution, but there are clever folks out there who will figure away around the tech. The easiest way around the tech is often right through the user.

Well, I should probably skedaddle. Suzanne works way too early and I'll be off on a merry 12-hour adventure. Nighty-night!

Ivan Shamiakin died today...

I had no idea who that was either. I just wanted to see if any notable deaths had occurred today. There's a limited selection of Shamiakin stories here (one German, one English, three Russian). I'm going to read the English one.

Yahoo! appears to have recently made more of their news content available via RSS. The speaker at Gnomedex said they would be increasing the amount of RSS material available. We also received Yahoo! Search mousepads as schwag in Tahoe. To see the shortcuts to use with Yahoo!'s search instead of that other one (which I totally dig), click here.

We caught wind of this at work today via e-mail. This is a prime example of what we'd call a teamwork failure. Nuclear operators work long and weird hours at times. We're supposed to help each other and make sure that we keep doing it right (e.g. staying awake). Nuclear worker fatigue is not a new issue by any means (as can be ascertained here). I just hope that the actions of one sleepy individual don't get the proposed working hour restrictions being suggested by this group rushed into place. We try our utmost to keep each other out of trouble where I work.

Ever in the mood to try something new, I downloaded this cool THING.

Thank you Thing.

What is this thing, you ask?

I've downloaded the Google Desktop search tool.

Oh yeah... one other cool thing I've downloaded recently is IZArc. Why do I like it? Here's one part of the answer:

"IZArc is the ultimate archive utility suports many archive formats like: 7-ZIP, A, ACE, ARC, ARJ, B64, BH, BZ2, BZA, CAB, CPIO, DEB, ENC, GCA, GZ, GZA, HA, JAR, LHA, LIB, LZH, MBF, MIM, PAK, PK3, RAR, RPM, TAR, TAZ, TBZ, TGZ, TZ, UUE, WAR, XXE, YZ1, Z, ZIP, ZOO."

The price is right (free, although I'll strongly consider supporting their work monetarily), the install was quick and easy, and from what I can tell, IZArc can decompress most anything. Very cool!

Perhaps more later...

I do NOT support John Kerry. I do NOT support George Bush.

However, hearing Dubya and Bill Frist (post-debate) say that John Kerry has done nothing in 20 years is getting slightly shallow, old, and seemingly misleading. I don't know how Kerry's record compares to that of any other Senator. However, he has sponsored bills and amendments to bills. Click on the links below to see the list of bills, amendments, and/or resolutions that Kerry has sponsored since 1985:

99th Congress (1985-1986)
100th Congress (1987-1988)
101st Congress (1989-1990)
102nd Congress (1991-1992)
103rd Congress (1993-1994)
104th Congress (1995-1996)
105th Congress (1997-1998)
106th Congress (1999-2000)
107th Congress (2001-2002)
108th Congress (2003-2004)

In order to maintain a hint of objectivity, I must note that I can't think of a bill with Kerry's name on it as I can with McCain-Feingold, Sarbanes-Oxley, or Nunn-Lugar-Domenici. However, that doesn't mean he's been windsurfing for 20 years...

Yeah, today was (and still is) pretty mundane...

Well, at least it was mundane once I woke up. I'm ready to go back to work. Excepting the 12 hours of OT I worked on Sunday night, I've been off since last Friday morning. Today is the beginning of Suzanne's weekend.

Can you imagine what life will be like for Lynndie's baby if she gets hammered at her court martial?

Speaking of the Iraqi abuse...

The RAND Corporation released a paper earlier this year titled Public Diplomacy: How to Think About and Improve It (.pdf file). I'm sure that Lynndie and her compadres didn't do much for America's image. The paper brings up some of the works of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Nelson Mandela. There are some great online repositories that include some of their respective works here and here.

I was considering watching the debates this evening, but we're not going to. First, Suzanne says she would be bored to tears. Second, most of the things we'll hear have been said repeatedly for at least the past ten months. Third, I've lost interest...

I haven't lost interest in seeing that Mike gets votes. Unfortunately, I won't be able to take part in the activities of the QC Badnarik Meetup group this weekend. This happens to be the weekend when they plan to hit the streets waving Badnarik signs. However, duty calls and seeing that I recently returned from vacation, I can't justify taking the time off this weekend. Drat!

I'm glad to hear that the US Supreme Court will tackle "Ten Commandments" issues. That could get interesting.

Well, I've gotta run. Suzanne's jonesing to get to Outback.

Suzanne was telling me that our niece called my in-laws today...

Our niece and her family had just returned from visiting Mickey Mouse. Olivia was telling my parents-in-law that today was a day off from school. I had no idea that today was a holiday (or at least local students had the day off). I suppose that the shiftwork addles my sense of time. 512 years... Damn, time flies!

Speaking of Christophers...

Go easy Kal-El!

Sean Penn... piss off! I really don't think that Trey and Matt are trying to encourage people not to vote. They might say something along those lines, but they are trying to be funny. That's what they do. Participating in the 2000 vote must have been a frustration to the 500,000 more people who voted for Gore over Dubya. The issue is even worse when you consider the usual complaints about "wishing for different options" and "voting for the lesser of two evils".

I love this picture. I was checking out Yahoo! news and I noticed that the lead picture in their news slideshow was a lioness carrying her cub from the Aalborg Zoo. That led me to the Aalborg Zoo website. I don't believe that I've ever gone to zoo sites looking for great animal pix. I love well-taken pictures of animals. I think it comes from having had a multi-volume animal encyclopedia set when I was younger. The pictures were gorgeous and the information about the animals was substantial for my age at the time.

I have to apologize...

I realize that I might sometimes come off as a raving lunatic bastard when I post here (particularly when talking about those who are in charge). I'm not a raving mad individual. I'm just frustrated by the political duopoly machine at times. I love this place and I wouldn't live anywhere else. That being said, I feel it necessary to spread the word that there ARE alternatives. Yeah, I won't change anything. Not by myself. I've heard catchphrases like "I wish there was an alternative choice" so many times. There are alternatives. I have mine, but there are others. However, when an alternative is presented, many people often seem to stick with one of the big parties for fear of a wasted vote. I don't see it changing anytime soon.

Here's why I feel that's dangerous. Bush says he believes in the concepts embodied in the UN. He also says that we won't ask them for permission to defend our country. He is right there. At one time, Kerry said that our troops wouldn't be deployed without the blessing of the UN. More recently, he mentioned the "global test". That's BS! However, my take on things is that Bush's war on terror (and the one in Iraq) have the potential to (and are) leading us down a slippery slope of interventionist foreign policy. When I speak about my choice, one of the biggest complaints I hear invokes the demon of isolationism. It's true (somewhat). If my choice became reality, we would try as much as possible to extricate ourselves from the governmental affairs of the rest of the world. I don't feel that that's a bad thing. We've opened and rubbed wounds in the interest of the US for the past one hundred years. Stepping back wouldn't end terrorism, but it would allow us to focus better and let us stop rubbing SOME of the wounds that, while not causing terrorism, aggravate the situation.

Is Gnomedex 5 in the works already? If we can make it next year, we will.

Well, I don't know what happened to the DHS Daily Reports culled from the news media at www.nipc.gov. If you're interested in those types of matters, there was some interesting info culled from the news and put all in one place. This source has reports that appear to be maintained.

The mainstream news won't talk about alternative events that happened outside of tonight's debate so I will...

The candidates of the Libertarian and Green parties were arrested while attempting to gain access to the Presidential debate this evening. These two men are Constitutionally eligible and have sufficient ballot access to be theoretically capable of winning. The catch-22 experienced by these alternatives is extraordinary. They won't be admitted to the debates as run by the Commission on Presidential Debates because they don't poll at an arbitrary 15% in national polls. They will never get there unless the Libertarians (or Greens) get a candidate who is filthy rich or ultra-famous. This is sad. Voices are being squashed.

For the Libertarian account, read here.

For the account from the Green Party, read here.

Intel bonanza doesn't lend a great deal of credibility to Dubya and company...

The past two days have seen some interesting information come to light. The first was the news about a CIA report that found no conclusive evidence of ties between Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and Saddam Hussein. The second is the massive report about Saddam's WMD. I haven't read any of the material I am linking to yet because I have the pleasure of going in to work soon. The prepared testimony of Charles Duelfer and Brigadier General Joseph J. McMenamin, USMC before the Senate Armed Services Committee can be downloaded here.

We truly have a great country. Information like this is frequently available in near real-time when it's not being subjected to highly restrictive secrecy barriers. Sometimes those barriers are necessary.

The CIA has a wealth of useful information available on its website.

Although we don't hear much about the Mars Rovers anymore, they are still alive and kickin'. I almost forgot that our names are in the cosmos. Here's my proof. Here's Suzanne's.

Well, I have to run. Bye!

As I've noted before, the cable news channel we typically stick with is MSNBC...

However, like every other news channel, as soon as the candidate debates are over, they analyze them to death in search of the elusive answer to the question of who won. What follows here is only my opinion, so please take it as such. I feel that the American voter has lost. There are a few undecideds left out there. They have probably waited for these debates as part of their decision-making process. What they are getting is a sanitized, scripted, and lackluster rewording of the stump speeches that we've all been hearing for close to a year now. Hell, check out the Memorandum of Understanding for this year's farce. The candidates can't directly question each other or participate in any alternative debates. I won't even mention what I think of the fact that Constitutionally qualified candidates with sufficient ballot access are excluded.

The Nobels for Physics, Chemistry, and Physiology/Medicine have been announced. The awards for Literature, Peace, and the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel are due to be announced on October 7th, 8th, and 11th respectively. The Nobel site has some excellent material (or links to material) on Nobel winners.

The ACLU has a great portion of their website devoted to the Patriot Act and FOIA material they have obtained regarding Patriot. Searching through some of it, I found this chart of what the government can and can't do and under what circumstances. You've got to love the net!

This is a test...

This station is conducting a test of the Email Blogcast System. This is only a
test. In the event that this had been a real post....yada-yada-yada. You get
it.

RIP Rodney...

Now to less important news...

We're actually watching the debate between Cheney and Edwards. Suzanne isn't watching very much. It would be cool if Edwards brought up Halliburton and Cheney dropped the F-bomb again. At least Cheney isn't making goofy looks of exasperation...

Speaking of the F-bomb...I was filtering through some of the IP traffic to my site. I noticed that several of the IPs were from Saudi Arabia. Without thinking much about it, I went searching through some of the IP range. It just so happens that I have IE titled with...let's just say a very colorful title. Hopefully I won't offend anybody who will be reading their logs. Must...use...Firefox...

Speaking of Firefox...Give it a shot!

John Edwards is bitching about outsourcing and John Kerry voted for NAFTA in 1993. I suppose that's similar to Cheney's disagreement with Dubya about the Federal Marriage Amendment. Viva la revolucion! When I mention to people that I'm voting Libertarian, people ask the inevitable question about a wasted vote. I always opine that a vote for either of the political juggernauts is a waste.

In closing, keep an eye out here.

We DID make it home safely last night around 8:30 PM...

The plane ride was fairly uneventful but driving damn near straight into the sun while leaving Chi-town in the thick of traffic was quite a feat. Suzanne and I thought that Gnomedex kicked ass. As usual, I don't normally meet a whole lot of new people when I go to something like this because I hang around with Suzanne and beyond that, I'm fairly introverted. I am pleased to have met and chatted up Jim and Michael. Additionally, meeting and talking to the individuals responsible for majorgeeks.com was A-OK! We're already raring to go next year...

One thing that a rep from Yahoo! brought up on the closing night was their newly retooled "My Yahoo!" portal. I was using it before we even went to Lake Tahoe. One ultra-cool feature they have set up is the ability to integrate RSS feeds right into your own "My Yahoo!" page. You can also do this with your favorite blog(s). See?


Obviously, you have to be signed up on Yahoo! to use the features available, but it's nice to be able to view the latest headlines and blog posts all in one convenient spot. If you do sign up, be sure to visit your account page and set up the "marketing preferences" as necessary.

I knew I should have called in last night to see if I was supposed to work today. As it happens, I didn't. Oh well, I was in and out very quickly.

One last thing... If you run Windows and want a good graphics editing program on the cheap, think about getting GIMP for Windows. When I was trying out Linux on my desktop, I used The GIMP and I loved it. Having played around with it for a few hours this afternoon, I was reminded of the fairly extensive feature set that it has.