Sunday, February 29, 2004

The Process of Governing

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This is about process, not gay marriage

The official talking points out of the White House is that the Constitutional Amendment banning Gay Marriage only came about after Activist Judges forced the President to intervene (See, for example, this Op/Ed in todays NYT: How the Judges Forced the President's Hand).

It turns out that's simply a giant lie, according to a GOP aide quoted in the Rocky Mountain News:

"President Bush pledged to Rep. Marilyn Musgrave that he would support her proposed constitutional amendment prohibiting gay marriage three months before he made Tuesday's public pronouncement, according to Musgrave's top aide.

The White House has said Bush made the decision only after officials in San Francisco and New Mexico presided over same-sex marriages.

Guy Short, Musgrave's chief of staff, said Musgrave discussed her Federal Marriage Amendment with the president during a Nov. 24 trip aboard Air Force One to Fort Carson, where Bush visited troops and met with survivors of military personnel killed in Iraq."

Those confidential assurances by the president encouraged Musgrave and her staff to proceed. "We wanted to respect his timing, but we knew it was coming," Short said.

Forget the politics of this: My concern (I'm an independent) is the process of governance: There is simply a frightening over reliance on deception and falsehoods from this administration. Any scientist understands the obvious dangers of this in research. There is a similar problem with this form of governance. We saw it with Stem Cell Research, with Iraq (and you may recall I was pro Invasion but for reasons other than WMD), with the Medicaid program, with tax cuts (many of which I supported), and on the deficit projections.

And now, the same pattern arises with the proposed Constitutional Amendment prohibiting Gay Marriages.

This should be a concern for every US citizen. This impacts our credibility in the World -- and that's important for a debtor nation who's financial obligations are 46% owned by foreign investors and governments. If they ever decide to stop buying US Treasuries, we would be in some real fiscal trouble. Their purchases are what's keeping interest rates so low. If overseas governments stop buying US Treasuries, interest rates would spike up dramatically. That's why, setting aside the politics of Gay Marriage or Stem Cell Research or whatever -- the process of government needs to be credible and transparent. At present, its neither.

In politics, as in most endeavors, I expect to disagree with people. I frequently engage in enthusiastic debate. Occasionally, I will even have someone change my mind. But I never expect totally disingenuous argument with fabricated facts, timelines, details and data. That is simply and totally unacceptable -- even in Politics.

Yes, there are lies, damned lies, and statistics. Soon, we may need to add a 4th category: the "factual" basis for any policy announcement out of this White House.


UPDATE: March 1, 2004 6:54am
A reader points out that this CNN article from July 2003: "White House considers constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage:"

"A day after Bush revealed his staff was looking at ways to "codify" his belief that marriage should be limited to unions between a man and a woman, his spokesman noted a constitutional amendment is being "publicly debated" and acknowledged it is something the White House is considering "in this context."
The article does quote White House spokesman Scott McClellan stating "There is speculation there may be some decisions soon in places like Massachusetts and New Jersey, so it's a question of what may be needed legally to protect and defend the sanctity of marriage." However, given the President's committment to the amendment in November 2003, prior to the court decisions, its apparent that the judicial activisism is merely a convenient excuse for pursuing this amendment, decided upon long before the court decisions.



Sources:
Bush pledged to back ban in Nov., Musgrave aide says
Bill Straub, Scripps Howard News Service
February 28, 2004
http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/state/article/0,1299,DRMN_21_2690146,00.html

How the Judges Forced the President's Hand
By LISA SCHIFFREN
OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR
NYTimes, February 29, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/29/opinion/29SCHI.html

White House considers constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage
Bush wants to 'codify' definition of marriage
Dana Bash
CNN Washington Bureau, Thursday, July 31, 2003 Posted: 5:27 PM EDT (2127 GMT)
http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/07/31/bush.gay.marriage

Posted at 09:25 AM in Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Hummer envy?

Just in case the Hummer wasn't big and dumb enough for you: The Maxi Mog:

Mog.jpg

In case you have a really, really small penis.

Posted at 07:38 AM in Art & Design | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Saturday, February 28, 2004

Get a f%@$ing clue!

I am dumbfounded that I continue to receive email from people that is so readily obviously and readibly provable as false. From smart people, too. People who should know better.

All anyone needs to do is go to Snopes.com to verify that. (Or are you all too fat and lazy to do that?)

C'mon people, its 2004 -- get a clue:

Bill Gates isn't sending you money for forwarding an email, nor will sending a plea to 10 people help cure a little girl with cancer. No, the ACLU isn't stopping Marines from praying before they go into battle. Al Gore did not claim he "invented" the Internet, Neil Armstrong never said "Good luck, Mr. Gorsky!," President George W. Bush never proclaimed, "The problem with the French is that they don't have a word for entrepreneur." Did Kurt Vonnegut give a commencement address at MIT where he advised the graduating class: "Wear sunscreen"? No. Is Disney giving you an all expense paid trip to Disneyland for forwarding an email? No. And toilets do not flush clockwise in the northern hemisphere and counterclockwise in the southern hemisphere.
On the other hand:
a Canadian radio commentator Gordon Sinclair did deliver a stirring, pro-American editorial -- but it was in 1973. Yes, a couple rented a video camera and VCR, taped themselves having sex, then accidentally left the tape in the player when they return it to the video store. Hermann Goering did proclaim that although "the people don't want war," but they "can always be brought to the bidding of their leaders." Monkees band member Michael Nesmith's mom did invent Liquid Paper correction fluid. Yes, in 1973 Monty Python released a 3 sided record album. And a speeder caught by a photo radar trap did send in a photo of $45 for his fine -- and yes, the police did send back a photo of handcuffs (the speeder paid the fine). And yes, there is a town in Austria called 'Fucking' (Its pronounced "fooking").
The point is that -- thanks to Snopes and Google-- all these stories are very, very easily disproven or verified.

Before you blindly lurch to forward some idiotic email, ask yourself this simple question: I am that gullible? Am I so naive that some 13 year old is playing me for a chump?

Goof emails are the modern equivalent of the phony phone call. So ask yourself:

• Do I have Prince Albert in a can?
• Is anyone here's name "Dick Hurtz?"
• Is that a bag of flaming poo on my front porch? (better stomp on it).

People, its 2004. Get a clue . . .

Posted at 08:10 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Friday, February 27, 2004

Will Clear Channel's Stern Ban Boost Satellite Radio?

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The government has gone into freakish overdrive/overreaction in terms of censorship; You might not like Stern but once it happens to Stern, it can happen to anyone. Ironically, you may recall that Stern released a CD some years ago called Crucified by the FCC -- which is now a collectors item on eBay.

Coincidence?
crucified.jpg

Via Adrants


UPDATE: 02/27/04 8:50PM

BuzzMachine's take on the matter is too good not to quote extensively:

The death of broadcast

: Clear Channel has cut off Howard Stern. When Janet Jackson's outfit opened, it opened a door not on her breast but on censorship. Clear Channel even sent out a press release bragging about cutting off Stern. MarksFriggin, the unofficial Stern site, says those stations are in Pittsburgh, Ft. Lauderdale, Orlando, Rochester, Louisville and San Diego. Clear Channel also fired Bubba the Love Sponge.

: Here's how I predict this will play out:
- Stern will engineer his firing from Viacom.
- Stern will sign with satellite, giving satellite the boost it needs to become a viable business.
- Buy satellite stock now. Sell radio stock now.
- Broadcast radio will quickly falter, losing attention to MP3s, satellite, and cellular broadcast. Broadcast radio will die. Consolidation won't kill it. Censorship will.
- Satellite will grow rapidly, getting more consumer revenue and ad revenue.
- Broadcast TV will suffer similar blows.
- Cable and satellite TV will grow.

The bottom line: Any medium that can be government-regulated will shrink; any medium free of government regulation will grow. Government censorship will grow until, at long last, libertarians and Republicans and Democrats wake up and realize that this is not the role they want for government, this is not the America they envision. But in the meantime, they will have destroyed a medium or two

Hope he's right . . .

UPDATE: March 3, 2004, 2:14pm

Charles Kuffner's Off the Kuff hits the nail on the head:

Surprise! Turns out ClearChannel has a funny definition of "indecency:"

So the evil conglomerate Clear Channel is waging war against indecency - they've dropped Howard Stern from the 0.5% of their member stations who were running his show, they've fired Bubba the Love Sponge, whose antics in Tampa they were surely unaware of before now, and they've got everyone from local DJs to industry insiders all abuzz about the new trend in Non-Shock Radio.

And how do they prove their commitment to decent, clean, family-friendly airwaves here in Houston?

Clear Channel may have dumped Stern and Bubba the Love Sponge, but it recently added controversial radio jock Michael Savage to its lineup at KPRC in Houston. MSNBC fired Savage last summer after he referred to a caller to his weekend cable TV show as a "sodomite" and said he should "get AIDS and die."
Ken Charles, Clear Channel regional vice president of programming for Houston, did not return calls from the Chronicle on Thursday.

Yeah. That Michael Savage
Here's Ken Charles' contact page. Feel free to thank him for doing his part to make the airwaves so much more clean and decent here in Houston.


via Off the Kuff:

Posted at 03:13 PM in Finance, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

No joke: Bill Hicks

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To follow up on our previous Hicks posts, let me poitn you to a terrific read in the British paper Guardian about the late great Bill Hicks, titled "last laugh."

Here's a quick look:

"He was sceptical, scatological, struggling for success on his own terms. Then suddenly life changed for comedian Bill Hicks: his work was being taken seriously - and, at 31, he was dying. Ten years on, John Lahr pays tribute

My New Yorker profile of Bill Hicks, The Goat Boy Rises, sat unpublished at the magazine for nearly four months. Hicks's ban from the David Letterman show and his subsequent 31-page letter to me explaining what had happened provided the impetus to get the profile into print straight away. It appeared on November 1, 1993.

"The phones are ringing off the hook, the offers are pouring in, and all because of you," Hicks wrote to me the following week, signing himself "Willy Hicks"."It's almost as though I've been lifted out of a 10-year rut and placed in a position where the offers finally match my long-held and deeply cherished creative aspirations... Somehow, people are listening in a new light. Somehow the possibilities (creatively) seem limitless."

Rereading Hicks's letter now, 10 years later, the parenthesis in the last sentence hit me like a punch to the heart. Hicks was suddenly, to his amazement, no longer perceived as "a joke blower", the kind of pandering stand-up he hated.

features.bmp



Source:

No joke: Bill Hicks
The Guardian
Saturday February 14, 2004
http://www.guardian.co.uk/arts/features/story/0,11710,1146768,00.html

Posted at 05:08 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Thursday, February 26, 2004

Top twelve reasons homosexual marriage should not be legal:

1. Homosexuality is not natural, much like eyeglasses, polyester, and birth control.

2. Heterosexual marriages are valid because they produce children. Infertile couples and old people can’t legally get married because the world needs more children.

3. Obviously gay parents will raise gay children, since straight parents only raise straight children.

4. Straight marriage will be less meaningful, since Britney Spears’ 55-hour just-for-fun marriage was meaningful.

5. Heterosexual marriage has been around a long time and hasn’t changed at all; women are property, blacks can’t marry whites, and divorce is illegal.

6. Gay marriage should be decided by people not the courts, because the majority-elected legislatures, not courts, have historically protected the rights of the minorities.

7. Gay marriage is not supported by religion. In a theocracy like ours, the values of one religion are imposed on the entire country. That’s why we have only one religion in America.

8. Gay marriage will encourage people to be gay, in the same way that hanging around tall people will make you tall.

9. Legalizing gay marriage will open the door to all kinds of crazy behavior. People may even wish to marry their pets because a dog has legal standing and can sign a marriage contract.

10. Children can never suceed without a male and a female role model at home. That’s why single parents are forbidden to raise children.

11. Gay marriage will change the foundation of society. Heterosexual marriage has been around for a long time, and we could never adapt to new social norms because we haven’t adapted to cars or longer lifespans.

12. Civil unions, providing most of the same benefits as marriage with a different name are better, because a “seperate but equal” institution is always constitutional. Seperate schools for African-Americans worked just as well as seperate marriages for gays and lesbians will.


via GatorGSA

Posted at 05:41 PM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (36) | TrackBack

Baboochi!

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Out of the NY Toy fair comes this story of a beautiful planet called Babooch. Nearby were the evil Zartans, who were very mean and did not take care of their planet. Long story short, when the Zartans were preparing to invade, the pacifist Baboochies figured they better find another palce for themselves (or the Zartans).

Then one day they found a nice planet that they had never seen before. The Zartans can’t live there, but Baboochies can! The planet is called Earth . . .


via Underground Online

Posted at 07:12 AM in Design | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Its Official! Jews killed Christ

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At least, according to some half wit pastor in Colorado.

The Denver ABC news channel reported that a "billboard unveiled on Ash Wednesday, the same day that a controversial movie depicting the last hours of Jesus Christ premiered, is sparking criticism from people of all faiths." In a graceful example of understatement, the Denver Channel ran the headline "'Jews Killed Jesus' Sign Causing Controversy." Uh, yeah.

Ironically, the idiot pastor's church is titled the Lovingway.

The large-size outdoor marquee, which sits on the property of the Lovingway United Pentecostal Church at Colorado and Mississippi, says, "Jews Killed The Lord Jesus" and the word "Settled!"

Thank goodness! For a moment there, I thought we might have to rely on the Bible for this sort of thing. It turns out that a movie by Mel Gibson has definititively resolved the issue. Now we can begin to study the 20th Century via Mad Max/Road Warrior and the Lethal Weapon trilogy.

I never understood why I, as a Jew, have to explain the New Testement to some people. I am familiar with the words of Christ -- if not as my Savior, then at least as a teacher and philosopher. It never ceases to amaze me how the people who are the most zealous enthusiasts fail to understand even the simplest of plots in the bible. The lessons taught there seem tto go right over there heads.

Ignore for the moment that the Romans were the actual wielders of the hammer and nails, and further ignore the inconvenient fact that Jews were a dispossessed group of people, even in Jerusalem, who the Romans kept us around as tax collectors (While many people 2,000 years ago were illiterate, Jews could read, write and do math).

That said, assume for a moment that Christ wasn't crucified. That the Jews "rescued" him, and begged the Romans for release. That they chose for clemency not the murderer Barabbas, but instead pciked Jesus the prophet.

Then what?

Without the Cruxifiction, as ordained by God (remember him?) Jesus would have just been another guy, a carpenter making furniture in Nazareth. Perhaps philosphy and spiritual teaching would have been his "hobby." The whole "Son of God" thing? That never would have been validated via the cruxifiction.

"My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me?"

"You know Jesus, you're right. You're free to go. Pontius Pilate, take him down" the Lord boomed. "Nothing to see here folks, move along."

That doesn't seem to be a particularly spiritual ending -- at least not as it was described in the Bible.

You see, as I've read it -- and again, let me point out that I'm a hook nosed money lending Jew, so I could be wrong -- it was God who sent his only Son to die for our sins. Perhaps the good pastor in Colorado overlooked that small issue.

Other people haven't. We The People observes:

"The crucifixion was the solution. What was the problem? Sin. Our sin. Every one of us. Who solved the problem? God. He sent His Son. So, who is responsible? God or man? (Notice I didn't ask God or Jews...)"
Hmmmm. Can you get a job as a Pastor if you have never read the bible? Apparently, you can in Colorado and Missisippi.

Source:
'Jews Killed Jesus' Sign Causing Controversy
Pastor Refuses To Remove Or Change Saying On Outdoor Marquee
POSTED: 9:41 am MST February 25, 2004
http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/2873395/detail.html

We The People
http://www.perfect-union.org/archives/000016.html

Posted at 06:51 AM in Film | Permalink | Comments (8) | TrackBack

Wednesday, February 25, 2004

SoundBridge

Soundbridge.jpg

Introducing the world's coolest network music player! The Roku SoundBridge lets you play your Mac or PC digital music files anywhere in the house. All major audio formats are supported — MP3, WMA, AAC, AIFF, WAV, FLAC and Ogg-Vorbis — and it's network ready with wired Ethernet or an optional CompactFlash Wi-Fi adapter. A large, bright display and Apple RendezvousTM and native iTunes® support make this player a winning part of your home entertainment system.

From the FAQ:

The world’s coolest networked music player. It streams your digital music remotely from your PC or Macintosh to any room in the house (either wired or Wi-Fi). Features include:
Supports the most audio formats of any music player
Very large, easy-to-read VFD display
Easy to use interface
Plug-and-play
WiFi and wired Ethernet support
Native iTunes support
Support for Windows or Mac platforms and music formats

From Roku's feature list:

Finally, a digital music player that looks as good as it sounds! Roku presents the SoundBridge music players, featuring a unique design that fuses beautiful, large displays with compact, sleek enclosures. The SoundBridge connects your stereo or powered speakers to your computer’s digital music library.

M1000: 10 inches wide, large 5 1/2 inch display
M2000: 17 inches wide, huge 12 inch display

Which looks like this:
roku_m2000float.jpg

This is pretty cool -- too bad the price is so high: $449.99 for the 12" display, and $249.99 5 for 1/2 inch display.

via Gizmodo

Posted at 02:02 PM in Design, Music, Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Google Hacks

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Douwe Osinga has created a number of interesting "Google Hacks" as [art of an ongoing programming experiment.

He notes that his projects are "Google Hacks in that they use Google for something fun or interesting in a way that Google was not designed for. Google stimulates these projects in a limited way. The Google API allows programmers to do up to a 1000 searches a day from their own projects. Pretty neat, except for that a 1000 is not that much when a service becomes public, especially since some hacks below use more than one search per operation."

If you have any interest in either programming or web search, you should check it out.


via linkfilter

Posted at 12:07 PM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Tuesday, February 24, 2004

Home Taping is Killing the Music Industry

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This was the rallying cry of the Music Industry in the 70s and 80s. Of course, that turned out to be a canard.

Substitute "File Sharing" for "Home Taping," and you get the exact same hyperbole from an industry as clueless today as they were 30 years ago. (When will these guys learn?)

Do yourself a favor, go over to Downhill Battle, and order a T-shirt. They are only $8 bucks.

Take a stand.

Source:
Downhill Battle
http://downhillbattle.org/postal/index.html

Posted at 05:38 PM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Grey Tuesday

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Today is Grey Tuesday. There are online protests to "Free the Grey Album." (We've previously noted the story of the Grey Album).

Be sure to go to GreyTuesday.org to check out why the music industry is abusing copyright laws to restrict artists freedom to create new music.

GreyAlbum.jpg

UPDATE: 02/25/04  5:53 am
Grey Tuesday was a smashing success. In addition to over 400 sites hosting the album, there was substantial mediacoverage, including the NY Times, BBC, and E!. Downhillbattle has a full post mortem.

Defiant Downloads Rise From Underground  http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/25/arts/music/25REMI.html

Beatles remix web  protest
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3517661.stm

Grey Tuesday: Copyright or Wrong?     http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,13563,00.html?tnews

Source:
greytuesday via illegal-art.org

Posted at 03:01 PM in Music, Politics, The Beatles | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Bill Hicks 10 Year Anniversary

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This week is the 10th anniversary of the death of Bill Hicks. I had pointed to a site that had a rich collection of Bill Hicks Bootlegs.

This week, the BBC's U.K. Magazine has an article worth checking out: "Bill Hicks: Why the fuss, exactly?."

The Beeb asks the question within this context: "Bill Hicks - the anti-war, pro-smoking, corporate-bashing American comedian - died 10 years ago this week. What is it about his work that has meant his reputation has grown and grown?"

hicks_203.jpg

For those too lazy to point and click, here's an excerpt:

"Hicks remains popular because his comedy taps into a cynical, shoulder-shrugging attitude that is widespread today, where many believe the worst of politicians, corporations and other figures in authority, almost as a knee-jerk response.

"The targets of his anger were exactly the right ones for his time," she says. "Like 'people who work in advertising', whom Hicks urged to kill themselves. These are not exactly difficult targets."

Fans of Hicks will disagree - though many admit that they are, indeed, drawn to Hicks for more than his funny routines.

Micah Holmquist, a 26-year-old writer from Michigan, US, says, "I listen to Hicks' recordings because they are not just funny, but also embody a lot of the rage I often feel at the world. In the days and weeks after 11 September 2001, I found myself regularly listening to Hicks as an antidote to the hegemonic opinion in the US that there could be no context for what happened that day."

For others, Hicks has become a symbol of authenticity in an era of reality TV, ready-made pop and visionless popular culture. Tom Quinn, a 27-year-old fan from Wandsworth, London, says: "Hicks didn't sell out. He didn't bow to television stations or huge sponsorship deals. And he didn't seem to care about fame and huge earnings."

Go read the rest of the piece . . .


Source:
Bill Hicks: Why the fuss, exactly?
By Brendan O'Neill
BBC Monday, 23 February, 2004, 16:33
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/3513475.stm

Posted at 05:54 AM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Monday, February 23, 2004

An Auto-Erotic Asphixiation Circle Jerk Gone Horribly, Horribly Wrong . . .

Chopping Block is a darkly amusing comic about a serial killer (not to be confused with all the other serial killer comics out there). The author, Lee Adam Herold, notes "It is dark in here, but I have found a release valve. His name is Butch. He keeps me sane." Herold has received some terrific reviews and awards .

Here's some of that sanity:

NSync.jpg

Be sure to check out his link page. Lots of good stuff.




via linkfilter

Posted at 06:30 AM in Humor, Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Sunday, February 22, 2004

Art by Giger

If you were at all an Alien fan, get over to Giger's website. He has a number of sculptures up for sale, and they are simply way cool.


Biomechanoid

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Alein Head A classic!
alienbronzehead3.jpg

Kondor Very cool stuff . . .
kondor2432X324.jpg



via linkfilter

Posted at 03:49 PM in Art & Design | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Saturday, February 21, 2004

The Gay Agenda

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Very funny flash cartoon by Mark Fiore, a San Francisco cartoonist and animator whose work also appears in the Washington Post, L.A. Times and other publications.



via linkfilter


Posted at 02:37 PM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Friday, February 20, 2004

Kisses: the sexy urinal

"Kisses is always there in need and makes from a daily event a blushing experience! This is one target men will never miss!"

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I do not know if this is real or not; And quite frankly, I'm not sure why peeing in someone's mouth is perceived as sexy. Yet there still is something strangely amusing about this . . .

via metafilter

Posted at 11:29 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Blinded by Science

science.gif

Tom Toles hits the nail on the head again . . .



via Yahoo

Posted at 06:21 AM in Politics, Science | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Thursday, February 19, 2004

Gallardo: A mere $160,000!

A friend of mine who lives in California just ordered the new Gallardo. It looks like a sweet ride -- all wheel drive, sleek aerodynamics, balanced, aluminum V-10 which makes 493 HP:

gallardo_door.bmp

Considering the price -- a mere $169k -- its a fairly attractively priced set of wheels within its category. Now that Audi is Lambo's parent company, one would hope that the quality problems and maintenance issues which have plagued the Bull are behind it.

gallardo_interior.bmp

The new Lamborghini website was just rolled out, and you cna see a lot more pictures there.

gallardo_rear.bmp



Lamborghini.com via Linkfilter

Posted at 10:24 AM in Design | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Wednesday, February 18, 2004

Is Ashcroft a Fascist ?

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I almost fell out of my chair when I read this story:

Department of Homeland Security Monitoring Progressive Clothing Sites

Website access logs are wonderful things. It seems the DoJ and the Department of Homeland Security has been visiting online stores which sell anti-Bush t shirts.  
 
You read that right -- taxpayer money is being spent surfing the web for dangerous t-shirts!  

"The Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security were looking at th "Ouspoken Clothing" site, who notes "We hope they liked the Ashcroft Fascist button!"

But when they returned, we noticed something that wasn't so funny. Website access logs track when the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security stop by. We can see how they found us, what they looked at, and how many times they visited. We're watching them watching us - John Ashcroft would be proud!

At first we were amused that the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security were looking at our little site. We hope they liked the Ashcroft Fascist button! But when they returned, we noticed something that wasn't so funny.

Note the lines:

n021.dhs.gov - - [26/Jan/2004:04:13:29 -0500] "GET /faq.html HTTP/1.1" 200 8215 "http://sidesearch.lycos.com/results.asp?tab=web&query=progressive%20clothing&loc=1&rf=sidesearch&" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 5.0)"

n021.dhs.gov - - [29/Jan/2004:08:09:55 -0500] "GET / HTTP/1.1" 200 807 "http://www.altavista.com/web/results?q=progressive+clothing&avkw=aapt" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 5.5; Windows NT 5.0)"

For those of you who aren't access log literate, this means that they came to Outspoken Clothing via the search engines AltaVista and Lycos, where they searched on the phrase "progressive clothing." Now, maybe there is just someone working there who wants to buy our Anyone But Bush 2004 or Gay Marriage Now merchandise, but somehow, we doubt it.

It seems that the anti-terrorist division of our government is spending its time (and our tax dollars) doing web searches on people who disagree with their politics and have the audacity to say so on t-shirts. Progressive clothing = potential terrorist? Never mind that we're three pacifists running our business out of an apartment - because we don't like Bush, we might be a threat to national security. We're interested to see what happens the next time one of us tries to get on a plane!


You can see the entire piece, along with a lot more server logs, here.

(I almost created a category for "jackasses," but it was somewhat redundant with "politics")



via interesting people

Posted at 10:34 PM in Politics | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Tilt It!

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Kudos to MacMerc for discovering a devilishly simple method for determining if you have a winning Pepsi/iTunes bottle -- Tilt it:

"The secret is the angle. I've found it to be 25º, but that's really no use when you're out in the field. Just tilt it until it seems about that, and look up towards it (hold it above your head). With luck, you should be able to see under the cap." pepsi_itunes_directions.jpg

A loser will have the word "AGAIN" visible:

again.bmp

"It's easiest to read "again" and tag the losers because there are no random letters involved. You can spot a word like again from a mile away. If you don't see again and you have given the bottle a twist (to check from all angles), make a purchase. If not, hit the shelf."

You can see all the details at MacMerc


via linkfilter

Posted at 11:32 AM in Finance, Music, Shopping | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Global Warming Makes it Colder

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Terrific, what's up next - Locusts?

"According to Paul R. Epstein, at the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School. Global Warming is what's making it colder in the winter in the US:

Normally, water circulates in the North Atlantic like this: Cold, salty water at the top sinks; that sinking water acts as a pump, pulling warm Gulf Stream water north and thus moderating winter weather. But now, fresh water from the thawing ice and heavier rain is accumulating near the ocean's surface; it's not sinking as quickly. (The tropics are faced with the opposite phenomenon.

According to Dr. Ruth Curry and her colleagues at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the tropical Atlantic is becoming saltier; as warming increases, so does evaporation, which leaves behind salt.) The "freshening" in the North Atlantic may be contributing to a high-pressure system that is accelerating trans-Atlantic winds and deflecting the jet stream — changes that may be driving frigid fronts down the Eastern Seaboard. The ice-core records demonstrate that the North Atlantic can freshen to a point where the deep-water pump fails, warm water stops coming north, and the northern ocean suddenly freezes, as it did in the last Ice Age.

No one can say if that is what will happen next. But since the 1950's, the best documented deep-water pump, between Iceland and Scotland, has slowed 20 percent."

Thats just great. Perhaps we should call it Global Weather Volatility instead . . .



Source:
Global Chilling (PDF)
By Paul R. Epstein
NYTimes, January 28, 2004, Wednesday
http://nytimes.com/2004/01/28/opinion/28EPST.html

Posted at 05:38 AM in Current Affairs, Science | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Tuesday, February 17, 2004

Hope You Like Jamming, Too


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I'm on the LIRR every day. Some people were raised properly, and have at least a modicum of manners. If they talk on their mobile phones, they keep it quiet and relatively short.

Other people are simply rude annoying slobs. Babbling away like chattering monkeys, annoying eveyone within earshot with their self involved, idiotic blather. (Like Robert Cook -- who spoke loud enough that I actually could hear him giving his phone number to someone -- twice. Call Robert at 718-248-3041 and ask him why he has no manners and is such a pig).

Anyway, I am tired of getting annoyed at these cretins. Here's one (albeit illegal) solution.


mobile_jammer.jpg

Note that the FCC prohibits U.S. citizens from "building, selling, operating or importing" radio jamming devices. Dunno about dissasembling them. I'd like to buy one of these and take it apart -- just to see how it works.

There's a Houston Chronicle article all about the burgeoning "war of gadgets quietly playing out around the world" between cell phone users and those who are trying to preserve their privacy in the Houston Chronicle:

As millions embrace the freedoms of mobile communications, some people and companies are pushing back against the tide. They are fighting technology with technology, using detectors, jammers and other gizmos to defend privacy, security and sometimes sanity.

Jamming cell phones is illegal in the United States, but with pocket-sized jammers sold online by foreign companies and even on eBay, and the military and government already using such devices, the wireless fight is already here.

"It's like the battle between the radar detector and radar guns. It keeps on escalating," said Jeff Kagan, an independent telecommunications analyst based in Atlanta. He said the need for such devices is prompted by the "double-edged sword of technology."

There's also a good Slate article on the subject:

The physics of jamming a cell phone are actually quite simple. Cell phones operate by sending signals along a range of the electromagnetic spectrum reserved for their use. (In the United States that part typically is measured as either 800 or 1,900 megahertz; in Europe it's usually 900 or 1,800 megahertz.) All a cell-phone jamming device needs to do is broadcast a signal on those same frequencies, and it will interfere with any devices trying to transmit in that range. The net effect for a hapless cell-phone user? The phone's screen will simply indicate that no signal is available. Odds are most people won't even notice that their phones are being jammed. They'll just assume that they're in a dead spot—and feel annoyed.

Good stuff. Check it out.

Source:
Cell jammers declare war with signal
DAVID HO
Cox News Service, Feb. 14, 2004, 8:43PM
http://www.chron.com/cs/CDA/ssistory.mpl/tech/news/2402920


Hope You Like Jamming, Too

Cell-phone jammers may soon be all over.
By David S. Bennahum
Posted Friday, Dec. 5, 2003, at 3:34 PM PT
http://slate.msn.com/id/2092059/

Posted at 06:36 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Monday, February 16, 2004

Soople

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Soople (http://www.soople.com) is a very cool site that allows you to easily access all of the advanced features of Google:

• There is a page of Calculator functions, another that Translates multiple languages.

• Phone & Location features allows you to do ordinairy white pages / yellowpages look-ups, as well as Reverse look-ups: you can find a residence or business behind a number by entering the number+area code (e.g. (650) 330-0100)

• a "Superfilter function" allows search in multiple sites at once.

• a spcific site function searches within one site or domain

• You can Filter search results for file type:

Word       
Powerpoint
Excel       
Acrobat(pdf)
• Specific image search

• Search in latest news in US newspapers

• Search by number
(Example: UPS/Fedex tracking number or Patent numbers)

• Search for stocks in 5 finance sites

• Look who's linking to your site


If you are into research or extensive web usage, this is a MUST KNOW SITE.

Posted at 06:00 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Sunday, February 15, 2004

Red Army

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Very cool graphic design out of Singapore: The Red Army.

Nerve.jpg

TheRed Army. Once, an awesomeand feared force. Now, cartoon characters (very post modern), Which is the greate threat out of China: The military, or cheap labor and outsourcing?

Blood.jpg

Lenin once said "The capitalists will sell you the rope for their own hanging." Wonder if he expected that the rope would be manufactured by communist workers making a dollar a day . . . ?

zero.jpg

Good stuff. Check 'em out.


via Proto

Posted at 07:51 AM in Design | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Saturday, February 14, 2004

Manix lube

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Clicking on the ad will take you to Manix's website . . .

Can you might appreciate the subtlety of this ad, done by a Brazilian agency, for a lubricating gel (K-Y equivalent) targeting the French market? It appears the Brazilians were trying to come up with an ad that was neither offensive nor tasteless.

The picture looks completely innocent...until the details sink in.

Apparently, this ad has created quite a buzz in Europe. The ad company has won several awards for it, including 18th Annual London International Advertising Awards and the LEAFyear2 Awards Ceremony announced at the Galveias Palace in Lisbon, Portugal. (See the ad agency Ansell for more details).


If you don't get it, take your time. All I can say (as a hint), apparently, the stuff really works.



via Grayson

Posted at 05:28 PM in Humor, Media | Permalink | Comments (11) | TrackBack

Friday, February 13, 2004

Grey Album

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I downloaded the Grey Album from illegal-art.org. It's the most inventive album since the
Beastie Boys' Paul's Boutique. A truly marvelous application of sampling and mixing.

Oh, and its illegal.
(Better get yours before it disappears forever).

Here's the story:

DOWNHILL BATTLE -- DJ Danger Mouse's recent Grey Album, which remixes Jay Z's The Black Album and the Beatles White Album, has been hailed as a innovative hip-hop triumph. Despite that and the fact that only 3,000 copies of the album are in circulation, EMI sent cease and desist letters yesterday to Danger Mouse and the handful of stores that were selling the album, demanding that the album be destroyed.

"EMI isn't looking for compensation, they're trying to ban a work of art," said Downhill Battle's Rebecca Laurie.

"Special interests, including the major labels, have turned copyright law into a weapon," said Downhill Battle co-founder Holmes Wilson. "If Danger Mouse had requested permission and offered to pay royalties, EMI still would have said no and the public would never have been able to enjoy this critically acclaimed work. Artists are being forced to break the law to innovate."

The Grey Album has been widely shared on file sharing networks such as Kazaa and Soulseek, and has garnered critical acclaim in Rolling Stone (which called it "the ultimate remix record" and "an ingenious hip-hop record that sounds oddly ahead of its time"), the Boston Globe (which called it the "most creatively captivating" album of the year), and other major news outlets.


' THE GREY ALBUM '



You can download the album here.

01 Public Service Announcement
02 What More Can I Say
03 Encore
04 December 4th
05 99 Problems
06 Dirt Off Your Shoulder
07 Moment of Clarity
08 Change Clothes
09 Allure
10 Justify My Thug
11 Interlude
12 My 1st Song

Sources:
The Grey Album
http://www.illegal-art.org/audio/grey.html

Down Hill Battle
http://www.downhillbattle.org/

DJ DangerMouse
http://djdangermouse.com

Copyright and Music: A History Told in MP3's
http://www.illegal-art.org/audio/historic.html

Posted at 11:03 PM in The Beatles | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Simpsons: The Movie!

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In case you haven't heard already, America's most famous dysfunctional family are finally going to appear on the big screen:

"Simpsons creators Matt Groening and James L Brooks are leading a team of writers in developing an animated movie.

According to industry insiders, Al Jean, Mike Scully, Mike Reiss, David Mirkin and George Meyer are all on board. Work has already started on the script but the plot line is not yet fully formed. It is expected to be a longer more amplified version of the show similar to the concept of the South Park movie.

Chris Meledandri, 20th Century Fox's animation chief, said the team are "very excited about the possibility of making a Simpsons movie". "However, we are in the very early stages of developing an idea for the movie," he added. There is no clue yet as to a release date on the movie, but it is expected to be at least two years off."

Source:
SIMPSONS TO HIT BIG SCREEN
http://www.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30200-12989147,00.html

Posted at 06:44 AM in Film | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Thursday, February 12, 2004

Lutèce Closes -- Good Riddance

Lutèce was finally put to sleep after way too many years of expensive medical care.

I say, good riddance.

If you are expecting an anti-French screed here, forget it. I love French food, and there's only so long one can carry a grudge against the people reputed to have invented oral sex.

But as to the ancient restaurant, my ire stems from a very memorable -- and unpleasant -- meal there many years ago. While in grad school, I arranged a meal for about 8 fellow classmates who were all Summer Associates at midtown law firms. Skadden Arps, Kaye Scholer, Shearman & Sterling, Debevoise & Plimpton, Sullivan & Cromwell, Shea & Gould were amongst the firms where we were learning to play lawyer. (Several of us spoke French, also).

The food was totally forgettable -- mediocre, but overpriced. The service was rude, haughty, even obnoxious. I remember Jodi Peikof couldn't get a glass of water, despite asking politely 4 times. Everything else took forever. It was just a terrible and disappointing meal. We all swore off Lutèce for the rest of our lives. All of us have since moved on to bigger and better expense accounts --none of which spent a dime at that haughty shit hole over the next decade and a half.

Terrific marketing strategy: Alienate the next generation of customers! "Quelle dommage!" What a shock they succumbed to the weight of their own arrogance and stupidity.

The best comment of the lunch came when my friend Jeff Weitzman declared "This is totally authentic." How do you figure, Jeff? we asked.
In a fairly loud voice, he said: "Cause they treat Americans like shit in France also."

That summed it up perfectly.

UPDATE: 02/13/04 6:29am EST
My pal Jeff Weitzman weighs in with an email. Jeff, now a denizen of California, writes that my recollection of the meal was accurate, and he "had totally forgot about that lunch."

With good reason. He never went back, either.

UPDATE 2: 02/13/04 10:41am EST
Apparently, Gage & Tollner is following Lutèce intot he abyss . . .

Source:
C'est la Fin! Lutèce Closing After 43 Years
ERIC ASIMOV
NYT, February 11, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/11/dining/11LUTE.html

Eat and Be Merry; On Saturday 2 Classics Die
GLENN COLLINS and WILLIAM YARDLEY
NYT, February 13, 2004
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/13/nyregion/13restaurant.html

Lutece
(French) Price Range: Expensive to Very Expensive
249 E. 50th St.
Midtown East/Murray Hill
212-752-2225

Posted at 07:07 AM in Food and Drink | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

President Bush or Emperor Palpatine

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McSweeney's has an amusing quiz: The reader is asked to identify the source of the quote -- and there's only 2 choices: U.S. President George W.Bush, or Star Wars evil overlord Emperor Palpatine.

My 3 favorites:

2. "As a matter of common sense and self-defense, [we] will act against such emerging threats before they are fully formed."

9. "Delaying a vote in [Congress or Senate] would send a message that the [Republic or U.S.] may be unprepared to take a stand, just as we are asking the [international community or universe] to take a stand."

12. "We cannot stand by and do nothing while dangers gather. We must stand up for our security and for the permanent rights and the hopes of mankind."

See how well you do . . .

Via McSweeney
 

Posted at 06:42 AM in Humor, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Wednesday, February 11, 2004

Push Stars

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The Push Stars are one of those bands that has somehow managed to stay unknown by most music fans. Back before they landed a contract, they had won a "best unsigned band" award. On March 9th, they will release their fourth CD, called "Paint the Town" on 33rd Street Records.

Any of their earlier works are worth checking out. Their music is a combination of great pop hooks, catchy choruses, clever yet touching lyrics, and sublime vocals. Play that over driving guitars and you have the makings of top notch rock and roll/pop band.

Here are my two favorite discs of theirs:

After the Party
after_the_party.jpg

Opening Time
opening_time.jpg

These guys are a hidden gem.

Posted at 12:51 AM in Music | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Tuesday, February 10, 2004

O'Reilly Apologizes

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Credit where credit is due: Bill O'Reilly kept his word and apologized:

On March 18, 2003, O'Reilly said:

Here's, here's the bottom line on this for every American and everybody in the world, nobody knows for sure, all right? We don't know what he has. We think he has 8,500 liters of anthrax. But let's see. But there's a doubt on both sides. And I said on my program, if, if the Americans go in and overthrow Saddam Hussein and it's clean, he has nothing, I will apologize to the nation, and I will not trust the Bush Administration again, all right? But I'm giving my government the benefit of the doubt.

Today, Bill O'Reilly:

The anchor of his own show on Fox News said he was sorry he gave the U.S. government the benefit of the doubt that former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's weapons program poised an imminent threat, the main reason cited for going to war.

"I was wrong. I am not pleased about it at all and I think all Americans should be concerned about this," O'Reilly said in an interview with ABC's "Good Morning America." ...O'Reilly said he was "much more skeptical about the Bush administration now" since former weapons inspector David Kay said he did not think Saddam had any weapons of mass destruction.



Pandagon via CalPundit

UPDATE: 2/11/04 8:43 am
I just noticed that Yahoo News picked up the story, via Reuters:

Pundit O'Reilly Now Skeptical About Bush
Reuters, Tue Feb 10, 9:25 AM ET
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=765&ncid=762&e=11&u=/nm/20040210/people_nm/campaign_bush_oreilly_dc

Posted at 04:47 PM in Current Affairs, Media, Politics | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Dromaeosaur: 4 Winged Dinosaur

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Very cool story with lots of pictures. For dino fans of all ages:

Paleontologists in China have discovered the fossil remains of a four-winged dinosaur with fully developed, modern feathers on both the forelimbs and hind limbs.

The new species, Microraptor gui, provides yet more evidence that birds evolved from dinosaurs, and could go a long way to answering a question scientists have puzzled over for close to 100 years: How did a group of ground-dwelling flightless dinosaurs evolve to a feathered animal capable of flying?



courtesy of National Geographic

Posted at 02:03 PM in Science | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Monday, February 09, 2004

Linkfilter.net

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If you haven't checked out Linkfilter.net, you are missing a lot of fun. (I strongly suggest the skin: lcd - Liquid Crystal Display -- seen above)

Here's a short list of links I've posted.


Posted at 09:54 AM in Web/Tech | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Sunday, February 08, 2004

How to Survive IKEA

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How to Survive IKEA

"A fully immersive, 3D environmental adventure that allows you to role-play the character of someone who gives a shit about home furnishings. In traversing IKEA, you will experience a meticulously detailed alternate reality filled with garish colors, clear-lacquered birch veneer, and a host of NON-PLAYER CHARACTERS (NPCs) with the glazed looks of the recently anesthetized."

very funny. via fimoculous

Posted at 06:45 AM in Humor | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack