What does a TV weatherman and the Republican Party have in common?
A weatherman can incorrectly predict the weather every day and still have a job.
The GOP politicians can be wrong about everything else and are still in the running to be elected!
History
A Song for the Democratic Party Convention
This song always brings a tear to my eye Abraham, Martin & John should be played at every Democratic Convention.
Ireland in Isolation
This article highlights a danger for Ireland Shipping Costs Start to Crimp Globalization. Ireland is an Island! Almost everyone I’ve met in Ireland never think of Ireland as an Island (the center of the universe maybe, just not an Island). We have become so complacent about the availability of foreign goods and produce, we have forgotten that without cheap oil, we will have to live within our own agricultural means. Something the Lisbon “Yes” folks don’t seem to get yet. They believe that the mobile economy will balance the trade products and that putting fishermen and farmers out of business will not harm Ireland as a whole. Cheap oil has made this possible, and is no more. No more cheap fruit, and beef, no more massive highways and individual car ownership.
John Lennon sang Imagine, just Imagine no Oil.
The Civil war of Europe
One effect of the Lisbon treaty is to bring into stark relieve the different perceptions of politicians and citizens. More than a century ago in the United States there was a Civil war. And while the popular belief was that this war was over slavery, it was not. It is an issue which Europe faces now and in the future. What faced the U.S. was not an issue, but a right to deal with an issue locally, within the individual states representing the members of the United States. A confederacy of independent but unified States joined in common defense. The E.U. is currently just such a confederacy, but the Lisbon treaty seeks to move that into a Federalist, Centralist Nation. In the U.S.A. the Federalists sought to force the freeing of slaves on all the states, a centralist decision, which the State governments of the South had previously supported Slavery and while the topic was abhorrent, the subject could just as well have been health food or something. The central Federal government forcing decisions on State governments.
This is the fundamental goal of the Lisbon treaty, to allow the creation of laws created in the Federated European Parliament to be issued to member State/Countries superseding local control. Just as in the U.S., this was the trigger for the Civil War. The Confederacy lost the argument, and a more ridged Federal, Central government was established. As in the U.S. a decision will have to be made, will Europe be a Federal Government, or will it retain it’s individual Nations in a loose Confederacy of United Nations. War is an alternative to this decision making process.
The only government that has allowed it’s citizens to vote, to allow them to choose what they wanted, were the Irish. But the politicians of the member states want a federal government and have decided that their citizens shouldn’t be allowed to choose. They now seek to ignore the ‘No” and force another vote again until they get their ‘Yes’ because a for them, a ‘No’ will restrict their power. There is no up side for the peoples of Europe, very government seeks to restrict and control it’s citizens the question is who will do the controlling. Will the Irish control the Irish, or will Brussels.
The choice is ours!
A vote of ‘No Confidence’ for Brian Cowan
One other outcome from the Lisbon ‘No’ vote is a general presumption of a vote of ‘No Confidence’ of Brian Cowan and his government. Having set as a principal goal of his administration, a ‘Yes’ Vote for the Lisbon Treaty. The utter failure to attain this goal constitutes a complete failure of Mr. Cowan’s leadership. Couple this with his inability to present this before the EU Commission as the definitive response of the Irish People, he now seeks to nullify the voice of his own people.
It’s time now to vote directly for a ‘No Confidence’ of Brian Cowan in the Dáil.
Lisbon
Why did all the politicians believe that a constitution that had been voted down by the French, could be rename and sold to the Irish?
Why do Politicians now try to pass off the Irish No vote as not representative of the rest of the population of Europe who didn’t get to vote?
Why did the Politicians believe that a childish ‘Because it’s good for you‘ argument that doesn’t work on children, would work on the Irish Adult population?
Big questions. Questions that will never be answered by the current crop of Politicians because they don’t know any part of the Why in these questions.
I can think of a few, here’s one
A) It was only good for politicians
Hillary Lost … Honor, creditability and honesty
More or less I was correct, Hillary lost, while Boosting about starting more wars to defend the Jewish voters of Pennsylvania, she lost creditability. With the dirty politics she lost Honesty and with her Carl Rove political tricks and fear mongering she lost the last of her Honor. It’s too bad she never sees herself in the mirror, she will never see herself in the whitehouse again, except in her dreams.
Web Apps and customer vs carrier benifits
I have been in the market for a PDA replacement, and all the conversations I’ve seen, point to the Web Applications being the solution and replacement to client side development on such things as the iPhone/iPod Touch. This harkens back to the the early days of Web when Netscape was being put forth as the new web operating system. The issue then, and in many ways still is, bandwidth. The thin client on the browser required all code from the application to be loaded before the application could activate and the user become productive. This issue still continues in the mobile internet, currently most users using webapps experience delays in application behavior. And this brings up a new concern.
Mobile Web applications are benefiting wireless carriers (who profit from the addition bandwidth use of their users) more than the consumer. In some cases there are ‘unlimited’ data plans with carriers, but mostly there is a cap on bandwidth usage, with hefty overcharge fees applied.
It only makes sense to promote web applications if you are a carrier, or a lazy programmer. This is part of my reasoning for having a PDA, local offline applications. Particularly in Ireland where WiFi or other networks have been slow to deploy and 3G networks are very expensive. Low bandwidth Client-Server applications are the only really customer centric, consumer friendly application development path.
Web Apps are not the best path to my pocketbook.
Deteriorata in the New World
While this is a bit dated, it is still funny, if sad. I have been thinking of additions or modifications that would fit the current world conditions. Things like Global Warming, Corrupt government, the Iraq war etc. What would you add to this classic?
Go placidly amid the noise and waste,
And remember what comfort there may be in owning a piece thereof.
Avoid quiet and passive persons unless you are in need of sleep.
Rotate your tires.
Speak glowingly of those greater than yourself,
And heed well their advice, even though they be turkeys.
Know what to kiss and when.
Consider that two wrongs never make a right,
But that three lefts do.
Wherever possible put people on “HOLD”.
Be comforted that in the face of all aridity and disillusionment,
And despite the changing fortunes of time,
There is always a big future in computer maintenance.
Remember the Pueblo.
Strive at all times to bend, fold, spindle and mutilate.
Know yourself. If you need help, call the FBI.
Exercise caution in your daily affairs,
Especially with those persons closest to you;
That lemon on your left for instance.
Be assured that a walk through the ocean of most souls,
Would scarcely get your feet wet.
Fall not in love therefore; it will stick to your face.
Carefully surrender the things of youth: birds, clean air, tuna, Taiwan,
And let not the sands of time get in your lunch.
For a good time, call 606-4311.
Take heart amid the deepening gloom that your dog
Is finally getting enough cheese;
And reflect that whatever fortunes may be your lot,
It could only be worse in Sioux City.
You are a fluke of the Universe.
You have no right to be here, and whether you can hear it or not,
The Universe is laughing behind your back.
Therefore make peace with your God whatever you conceive him to be,
Hairy Thunderer or Cosmic Muffin.
With all its hopes, dreams, promises, and urban renewal,
The world continues to deteriorate.
Give up.
–From the National Lampoon Radio Dinner album.
Obama to be assassinated
Or at least that is the desire of some. I’m afraid there is a massive movement of miss information underway to undermine the Obama presidential campaign. Emails and messages are being passed throughout the American South and the Bible Belt that such things as Obama being a Closet Muslin and that he intends to swear into the Presidential Office on the Koran (Quran) rather than the bible. I personally thought this was silly until I saw this video God and Politics in Lynchburg Tennessee It’s amazing the ignorance being spoken here. But the more interesting is the indications that the source of the information is an ‘information artifact’ where there is no defined source for the ‘fact’ being quoted. But the the ‘fact’ carried such emotional weigh that it is believed because it falls into one’s own belief structure. This is dangerous, as Anti Obama information carrying such emotional power, evokes powerful reactions, like assassination.
Whatever became of the truth?
Bush’s friendly co-conspirator in the White House Lies and deception club has come up with something he can really sink his teeth into, The U.S. Propaganda Agency to quote;
…the United States is losing the war of ideas in the Muslim world, and the answer to that, in part, is through the creation of this new government agency
Whatever happened to the truth? If the truth isn’t there, someone will discover that it’s not the truth, and no amount of lying is going to make anyone listen to it. Mind you if you can control all sources of information (MSN, radio, TV, Internet), and either censor or block the truth, what does it matter what you say?
Radio Free Europe has been identified as one of the most useful tool to bring down the Iron curtain, on a simple principal, that even under political pressure, it would ONLY broadcast the truth.
But this administration doesn’t know the truth, to them, the truth is the enemy, and so we have what we have. A world of spin and deception.
Hillary Didn’t win, and Obama didn’t loose New Hampshire
When Hillary declares Hillary Wins New Hampshire! don’t believe it, she tied with Obama. They both earned the same number of electors from the New Hampshire primary. But Hillary would be hurt by declaring it a tie, and it would only serve to boost Obama in the future. Talk about spin, but that is the nature of an electoral system that is fundamentally broken and corrupt.
Cheney and Bush seeding false treasonous information
There seems to be a great deal of information masquerading as fact as to the nature of the treasonous act that have been committed by the Bush/Cheney administration. This could be that the conspiracies are starting to unravel, or it could be, as in the George W. Bush military service controversy which brought down Dan Rather the ‘facts’ being seeded in the internet may be believable, but false, and might be cited along with real evidence of the impeachable offenses commited by them. These could have been planted so that they could be refuted, and with them, the real facts relating to treasonable acts, as needed, if and when impeachment hearing begin. The GOP has never hesitated to publish outright lie’s if they thought that they could spin them later to their own advantage. Why should this be any different? They are just laying the groundwork knowing that the many crimes against American Citizens and the Constitution of the United States will eventually come to light.
Hero’s are what we wish leaders to be.
And when we seek leaders, in our politicians, or in any person during a crisis and even even in a fellow worker in our day to day work lives. Hero’s brighten our lives, lighten our loads and renew our spirits. On the average we never seem to have enough hero’s, and we often seek them in our dreams, the theater, and on the television.
In this coming election season, the hopes and dreams of the world seek a hero in Barack, Hillary, Fred, Ron, Dennis, Mike and Al and/or any of the rest. And the goal of those politicians will be to appear to be, those hero’s, to win our hearts and minds. But hero’s aren’t heros by selling themselves, but by proving themselves, not by convincing us to trust them, but by earning our trust.
We shouldn’t be looking for the lesser of the evils, but the best hope for the future.
…and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Testing the waters for faking the news
Seems that FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) has been testing the waters for the Bush Administration as to the viability of not just faking the information, but of faking the entire news reporting. In this apology FEMA sorry for fake news briefing the appearance is of this being an “error in judgment” is yet another attempt to fake the news, one that was discovered, and brought to light. But this was a test balloon, by an agency which has no more creditability to loose, and thus did not have anything to loose when attempting this deception. Only the tip of the iceberg, wait for more attempts in the future.