Rolls Royce sells more cars in 2011 than any other time in their HISTORY.
Need more proof that the top is getting further separated from the rest of us? Yes they introduced a new car in their lineup, at a lower price point... a *paltry* $250,000... instead of the $350,000 Phantom. What really irks me tho, is the battle between Democrats vs Republicans... like one is completely without fault and its all solely the result of the others politics. I know I vote for a lot of alternate party members when I vote. I'm tired of the two party system, its not productive, an hasn't been for much longer than I've been alive.
But, in the end... I don't even think a 3 or 4 party system would fix anything... until the money in politics is fixed. Corporations are not people, and money is not speech. Until then... The Zombie Apocalypse is just a matter of when, not if.
In some other universe... I think I'm a Civil Engineer. As its always interested me from when I was little and building my Cities out of Legos. However, One thing that really annoys me is road construction, and my belief that they always do it wrong. It stands to reason that the largest costs in the roads built by cities is in labor... and equipment, not necessarily in supplies for the common 3" asphalt road I see built. But, when the city (or state for that matter) pushes for a longer lasting road... why is it they do it in Cement? If you couldn't tell... I'm kind of a car nut... and as one... I love driving. (In yet another universe... I'm a car racer... and a fourth... i'm racing motorcycles...) Anyway... driving on tarmac/asphalt is much more pleasing of a surface, however I feel its got a bad rap because of these ill conceived 3" thick roads. If you were to make an asphalt road as thick with as much preparation under the road as what they put into cement roads around here... I believe they would get just as much life out of them for a third the cost. Granted... I'm pulling numbers out of my ass... but the Germans build the Autobauhn out of asphalt, but they're doing 12" of asphalt. And they have less maintanance! Anyway... thats been my opinion for years... and its irritating... because of the afore mentioned percevied bias of the only lasting road being cement... just isn't true.... least not for the lower traffic city roads... I think they could double the thickness and see tripple the life expectancy of it. But I know its all comes down to the money now... not what the future will bring. I know both political parties at the moment can't seem to guide the country out of that idiotic mindset... we're like a bunch of 2 year olds... need everything now... to hell with what will come later....
Well... They did it... not sure what their real goal is... but Unity is unusable in my mind. Its not that it doesn't "work"... its that it won't work for what I do. I can't find the 5+ different windows of the same app I'll have open on multiple desktops. I upgrade to 11.10... and after a week of using it... found that I'm more frustrated that ever with it. This is the same reason... I can't work with MacOSX. Windows 7 with my limited uses of it... does seem to actually have a method which might possibly work with this new design for desktops... but I have no way of knowing for sure... since I've yet to see multiple desktops on them. Gnome Shell might not have the same flaws as Unity in this respect... however with Ubuntu going full steam into their Unity desktop. I split the jobs I have at hand between 5 desktops on my current laptop. Work Email + Random simple tasks on desktop 1, development tasks on desktops 2 and 3 (separate projects), Music/entertainment stuff on Desktop 4... and whatever else comes along for desktop 5. This is what works for me... and forcing me to change... means I'll find something else that won't. So... I reinstalled my desktop yesterday to ubuntu 11.04... I will stay there until I find a suitable replacement... which will probably be Straight up Debian again. (I ran Debian Unstable on my desktop back in high school) But... I hate to say it Ubuntu/Cannonical... you probably will loose any and all recommendations from me. My laptop is not a Tablet, nor a Phone, I still have a laptop because I need to really work on it. My phone is NOT a replacement for it, and won't be for the foreseeable future... eventually probably... but not yet. That is all.
I'm having a problem lately having the motivation to post anything here... as I feel lately all I've wanted to do was rant about something going on in the every day life. However... posting a couple lines here and there... without much of a "title" has been seeming more appealing... I'll probably work that into my next site update... no "title" just a "post"... to which I'll allow comments to. All showing up on the front page, interspersed with blog posts.
With everything going on at work, and home... I have questions revolving around getting done what I see I need to...but aren't really a priority on anyone else's list?
While what I'm paid to do, is be a Systems and Network administrator... I'm also fairly competent and enjoy some development down time, but with the crazy schedule of projects at work, I haven't been able to set aside some time to do that aspect of what I view as my job. My fellow co-workers would benefit from the time I spent on it... once they learned how to use what I would create... but, really... they don't know that yet.... because they don't have the view of it all, like I do... does that make it my fault? Because I'm not communicating it clearly... or at all?
Whats more... whats up with feeling like I'm always two weeks behind where I should be? Is this really the future of what things will always be like... or is it still just the reality of my current job... and eventually... it will change...
Will my drive come back after I get some much needed downtime... I feel a bit burned out... because of the afore mentioned crazy schedule of project after project... never any down time to really fine tune anything.
I could recite it... and I have over the years I've had this blog... but... straight from a well spoken individual that was raised in just such the situation. I don't care what the "bible" says about it. We aren't talking about the bible here... we're talking about real life... in a country founded on the ideas of religious freedom, which says that any one "religion" should not have any say on the matter.
I watched a movie titled: Unthinkable over the holiday weekend. Which I will say, did have some disturbing imagery. So, for those that can't stomach the likes of the saw movies... don't watch it. However, I did enjoy the movie and the situation that was trying to be portrayed. If you are watching it, and find yourself siding with "all the other assholes" or siding with Samuel L's "H" character, or do you find yourself siding with Carrie-Anne Moss's "Agent Brody" character? Personally... I think I was always in the position of Agent Brody, it seemed at times she might have questioned her own resolve to what she thought was right... but she maintained that stance.
If your wondering what the movie is about and aren't going to watch it... SPOILER ALERT....
The movie is about an (white... if that really matters...) American Islamic citizen, who's made a video of and planted "3" nuclear bombs in "3" American cities, and that those bombs will detonate in 6 days if his demands are not met. He then purposefully gets himself caught, which is when they bring in FBI Agent Brody and H. The character H's history, skill set and purpose is somewhat of a mystery at first... all you know is he's protected by the highest levels within our government. It turns out that he's an interrogator. The type that will stop at nothing to get what he wants. Which is where Agent Brody figures out what is going to go on... The terrorist is then revealed to be captured, and already in the process of being interrogated. If I remember correctly... he's being given the equivalent of water boarded... without the board. Something that's not learned about until at least a third of the way into the movie... is this terrorist, is not only an American citizen... he's special forces trained, in nuclear bombs. Has worked as a contractor for the Russians, Iranians, and probably more that I missing... either way... He knows what he's doing, had access and the ability to do what he said he's done. (There was a line in there that had the Iranians saying they lost 18lbs of plutonium and that our terrorist was the one that had to have had it. Which surprised H that they were so forth coming, and the reply was that if things went south, they didn't want us to think they had anything to do with it, and have us bomb the shit out of them.) Anyway, H begins with the torture, in order to get the information about where the bombs were planted. They work on him for 3 days? and the most they get out of him at one point is a location of "one" of the bombs... which, from the video "should" have been there... what ended up happening was that they went to the roof where a simple trigger was setup on a power breaker box, that triggered a small bomb of C4 to blow up in a shopping mall, killing 53 people. This is where Agent Brody seems to start questioning her own conviction of what is really right and wrong. And is where she allows H to go a bit further... and by further... he brings in the terrorist Ex-wife.... where he was going to make the terrorist watch as he tortured his wife.... The "others" (ie: all the other characters that have been around this... that have been objectionable, some overruled, but wavered quite a bit over what they would allow) all objected to this method H was about to use... which is where H swings his arm, hand holding a knife just as the ex-wife was going to be taken away... in which she is killed... This... in the end still does not break him, and is still not giving any more information. Which is where the "Unthinkable" portion comes into play... H wants the terrorists kids brought to him. Yeah... unthinkable right? With lots of objections from everyone, and H even promising to not "touch" the kids... just wants to make the terrorist think he will.... H is running out of time... locks himself in the room with the kids and preps them... while the terrorist is sitting outside now, watching.... This causes him to give up the three locations of the bombs, which in the story line they had found one on their own without him... and one of the locations matched with the one they knew about. Problem was... the bombs had only 4.5lbs of plutonium.... meaning they were still 4.5lbs shy of the full 18lbs that the Iranians said they lost. And this what the information H was trying to get out of him.
This is where the story was leading up to.... the terrorist had been playing them the whole time as H states in the movie.... he never told them about the C4 bomb... and he told them about "3" bombs. Meaning that if they were able to break him (the terrorist), he would still only have to tell them about "3" bombs... not the 4th that he had enough plutonium for. H was stopped before he was able to do anything to the kids, and Agent Brody essentially said to the possibility of a 4th, "Let it go off then". As the terrorist was able to grab a gun and kill himself, she took the kids and left the building. Which is where the movie ends. You never know if there was an actual 4th bomb... but it stands to reason that there would be.
The question I believe the movie is posing... is How far do you go? With as far as H went, they still never knew really if there was a 4th for sure? It took a couple days for the terrorist to say what his demands were... but when he did... two things... stop supporting fake regimes in Islamic countries, and pull all military forces out of Islamic countries.... yeah... that's it. Which is what I believe it would take to get them to leave us alone... So... again... How far do you go? Is torture ever ok? The research is in... and Agent Brody stated it several times... Torture rarely reveals anything useful.... because they get to a point where they'll say anything they think will get you to stop, regardless of how much they actually know.
So, I was doing my usual reading of my news sites and came across an article entitled: Study: Conservatives have larger Fear Center in brain. Which struck me as kinda odd. From the article, they do point out that while the scans of the brain were done on adults, it does not say its causative. Ie: its not saying that the people studied were born with the larger fear center or if it was developed over time. Which was actually the thought I had after reading the first paragraph.
Because the narrative I see when watching Fox News (which... I know... my banner says to turn it off... but I do occasionally stop and watch... tho... if anyone asks... I deny it.) is typically that of fear, fear of the unknown, fear of whats different, fear of what could be. You want me to get into everything you should be afraid of... just ask me some time... theres a lot, and I know of them... However I've chosen not to let the fear run my life, I have also accepted that nothing in this life is safe, and that there are things in this life, more important than "temporary safety".
In my day job... seeing the big picture is a requirement, and seeing how little decisions along the way can put an entire company at risk from various little exceptions to policies. Since this is not an IT exclusive, the same holds true for lots of different areas of life, and one civil liberty after another is whittled away under the "threat" of terrorism by the Conservatives, yet the same crowd is up and ready to take up arms it seems over the richest 1% paying 3.something % more in taxes? really? They're fine with the government spying on *US* illegally... instantly being treated as a terrorist when traveling and all other manor of civil-liberties being taken, but when something that doesn't even affect them and has nothing to do with their "security", thats abhorrently wrong and unamerican.
It just seems like a huge disconnect with whats real. The remote possibility of danger seems to trump all in the minds of conservatives, and Fox News media bias. And with a study saying that their fear center is overly developed in the brain... seems to make sense of the otherwise sheer lunacy that befuddles me.
If you didn't know already... I'm a huge fan of Cars. Love 'em, or hate... depending on the car. With my recent trips out to MillerMotorsports Park, to watch World SBK and do a little Kart Racing. I find myself thinking about it a lot more than I ever used to. Before I never did any of it, because of the cost... Now, being older... and thinking that Kart Racing gets me most of the thrill, or all of it, if you take the kart size ratio into account. I could do that... Kart Racing is relatively cheap... but I really need to loose some weight... However... regardless of how fun Kart Racing is (and I really mean it is). Its still not "Car" racing. I would love to take my motorcycle out on the track, but I'm also weary of wrecking on it...
Enter Skip Barber Racing School. Their Open Wheel Racing school would be completely amazing. I would love to take a mini F1, or big Go Kart, out on a track and have some instructions on how to do it all right.... One day.... One day...
I was just reading a few of my lasts posts... and noticed that its been quite a while since I've written anything... I'm not sure why really... I mean, I do get really busy with work and a lot of things frustrate me there... I know most of that I don't really know how to write about without specific details and, that is something I can't do. Maybe if I was better at writing... I could come up with something. I read a lot of developer blogs about python this or django that, but it seems I rarely think of the little things I could write that might be helpful to someone else in the NetAdmin,SysAdmin,InfastructureArchitect fields that I mostly deal in. All the little tricks I've learned... I need to write something for this blog that would allow me to add files to my posts so I can share a few of the little scripts I write occasionally.. And maybe some of the bigger things I've done, but that would need some kind of projects page... And for any of that to work... I would need things to not be so crazy. I don't know... I'll add a few of my latest scripts...they're not that large.
I've been stressed lately... about work and such... mostly because I'm a sysadmin/network admin as my day job atleast.... but... because I understand programming... and that I enjoy it on a very small scale... and I have my opinions on whats good and what isn't... I've somehow been given responsibilities of being a programmer? I'm supposed to write code to make the pieces of things I'm in charge of work... which... when its just me or even a few other guys that will be using said code... i'm ok with... but lately... Its been about me writing a web app for FTP.... managing FTP users in a database... which that part is done... and its fine... but really there needs to be a decent non standard SFTP server that can pull from the same database... and also needs the ability to do random one off transfers... so we don't need to fill the database up with thousands of user accounts that are used once and never touched again.
Which again... all that... in and of itself isn't that big of a deal... only I really suck at front end work... I mean... look at this site? most of what is here... has been ripped from something else... I kinda picked the colors.... but even that was with some help... they layout... just search for CSS Layouts and find a three column blog style... and you'll probably find what I'm using... I'm not that good at front end work... so... I guess thats where my big hangup is... if I could get someone to write the frontends to my apps... and it wasn't costing me anything... i'd be all for it... need a yin to my yang so to speak... backend stuff I'm good at figuring out... making that look good.... HORRIBLE
I'm in trouble... I love me a game of Civilization... and with the upcoming release of CivV They are supposed to be working on a version for Facebook... *sigh* please don't tell me that's the reason I end up joining facebook....
So... I'm at home today watching baby Zoey, and I'm flipping back and forth between CNN and Fox News.... CNN spent a good 20+ minutes showing whats going on on Haiti. During that same time... Fox... Nothing but how the state of the union tonight is very critical for the Presidents reputation, even within his own party! There are things he has to say in order to keep the Dem's from turning on him... yeah... so CNN is showing the horrible situation in Haiti... and fox is bickering and FUD stirring. Then Fox moves on to the recall of the "faulty" gas pedals of 8 models of Toyota's. Basically saying Toyota is a HORRIBLE company for having a faulty product AND RECALLING IT. ie: THEIR FIXING THE PROBLEM!! at the cost they even stated of 8 million a week! It wasn't government mandated... it was done at their own accord. But some how this is bad... they show up outside a New York City Toyota dealer and act surprised when someone doesn't see it as a big deal... of coarse they don't put that person on camera, because he was looking for a hybrid, but as soon as they find a crazy lady that agree's that toyota is a horrible company, she gets a full minute to spout her bias moronic view. Her pedal stuck in her toyota camery and she hit a pot, making her an expert that should deserve some face time on the TV, that these cars should be taken off the market (which they were... as noted previously in the story) but they were even hinting that people should stop buying Toyota's all together? WTF Fox! Really... Your about as fair and balanced as an iceberg.
===== Update ====== Just heard commentator say that "American's" probably wouldn't be so against the Health Care Bill, if they just knew what was in it. I'm befuddled... WTF!!! I don't know of any other channel thats put more mystery and added more confusion over just what was in the bill other than Fox News... so... to answer his question... its because of you, you ass-hat...
Wow... the drama and racisim of facebook... Some have asked why I'm not on facebook... and well... I wouldn't have many friends after a while.. I'd have a hard time holding my "tongue" with the hate, racism, and stupiditiy. I'm sorry, I watch fox news for as much as I can stand, I listen to KSL which retransmits hannity et. all... and honestly... If you know me, I'm very into technology, and my job depends on how well I can logically put things together, and so far... Fox News hasn't really stood the test of logic in my mind... most of their "reason's" fail basic Logical Fallacies tests. After having experienced a formal class on the topic, I have been wondering why these classes are not taught earlier in life... Why must one attend College to experience a class such as these? Do we not want our youth *thinking* to early? I mean I also believe our school system needs an overhaul... but thats another issue entirely. Because, by the time someone is college age... they've clearly made up their mind about things already... and there are a large portion that are... clearly, wrong. (Argued with quite a few of them in my classes...)
Yes, I just went there. In my life I've experienced a very wide range of people, as I've been communicating with people from all over the world since I was 12 years old (again, if you only knew half of my background in life... you might be amazed at some of the things I've done....) I've known a lot of different view points, and I too... used to claim to be Republican (I grew up in Happy Valley in Utah after all). What happen you might ask, well... during that time I must admit politics annoyed me, I still believed politicians were liars.(and to a degree I still do) But anyway, what I was working on in my life was trying to see how my "skills" I had self taught myself on the computer with many, many, many hours of reading and trial and error would fit into a paying career. Where I had been learning about "Free Software" and "Open Source", and what it means for Software Freedom, and the term FUD (Fear,Uncertainty and Doubt). This term became engrained in me and the deep meanings associated to it. I then figured, I could apply such ideals to everything else in my life, as those meanings were very well thought out and reasoned. This is where my political views began to change.
Part of my FUD mentality, I began to question everything, nothing was sacred and couldn't be touched. So everything I was supposed to believe went into question and I wondered why? Why? This is something that I still do today and a large reason why I describe myself as an Independent. I'm independent because I don't believe in having one type of answer for every situation. I'm not entirely conservative, nor am I completely liberal, but there are a few things they portray they stand for that I agree with. For example... I love the idea of being financially conservative, however I don't think either Republican's nor Democrat's are. I also believe US Citizens have the right to keep and bear arms(As I believe in the ideals set by the constitution). As I believe that its an excellent way of protecting ones self. Which leans me towards something else that bothers me.... A *Free* society is not a *Safe* society. So, to have freedom does not mean you *will* be safe. If you believe you can prohibit the rights of someone else, because one person or small group did something unspeakable, then what's to stop it from happening to you? Thats a slippery slope when would it end? The serial killers I can name off the top of my head are all white middle aged males... does that mean I should be locked up? Timothy McVeigh was also a home grown terrorist.... also white and middle aged... What I'm trying to say is that its *impossible* to say that one type of person is dangerous and should be barred from doing something. So.. you weigh your risks... you have to keep your eyes open, and watch for signs because it could be *ANYONE* and to be free means everyone has to be vigilant because stereo types won't get you anywhere.
One more thing... this health care bill... what do you people have against people getting well? What do you have against the government setting a minimum requirement of what a persons Health care plan covers? You already allow it for Auto Insurance... After all that is what the Bill dictates... its not anything really alarming its just gathering a bunch of standards *we already have* and reaffirming we have them, and then making some extensions like saying an insurance company doesn't get a get out of jail free card under the guise of *"PRE-EXISTING CONDITIONS"*. That is utter BS... I've seen PERSONAL stories straight from the person affected about getting dropped when they most needed the insurance because they were finally actually sick... paid all their life. I fear that one day that could be me... and if we can stop it now... we should. I know some of you will say that there are problems with health care but that this bill is not the right answer. And what I find amusing is that this question has been asked of the fox and friends crew... all of them and NONE of them have given an answer to that question, and what I've noticed is you also will not have a solution. You will however deviate and try to change the subject onto something other than health care and somehow thats how we can fix the health care system? what? really? Its a straight forward non trick question. And all I see is misdirection or ignorance to the problem from the right. The fact remains, ALL other fifth world counties have a national health care system, and they ALL rate above us according to the WHO. So... again, what exactly is it in this bill that will ruin our health care? All I hear is that it will ruin it, but why? I've heard it be the money issue, which is rediculous, because canada spends half what we do on their national system and medicade doesn't cover a third... there's lots of waste, theres lots of issues not saying the bill is going to fix them all, but its a good start.
So... I'm annoyed.. I watch/listen to Hannity and Beck, and co... as much as I can stand anyway. I can't stand how they constantly remind you that they are the only ones telling you the "truth". And because I have other resources I use for information, I recognise the lies and the errors in the logic. Also... they appeal to people emotions more than they use actual logic. But this one I enjoyed alot... because apparently Fox New thought that being able to count was all they really needed to know how to do. Not needing to understand anything about how an economy works. Let me explain what I mean, then I'll show you what they did... With regards to the bad economy and the number of layoffs that have been being reported every month for the last 6+ months. If a person is laid off, gets hired some where else, and laid off again... thats still just ONE person out of work... NOT TWO. Yet, could show up as two in the layoff totals for one month or one in two different months. And yet, the "truthers" would like you to believe that its two... as is evident from this reporting of the "truth" from Fox New:
If you'll notice, they're claiming that 147 million people are unemployed in the US... Very interesting isn't it? Yet the Department of Labor says that the national unemployment rate is only 9.8%... and with a population of just over 300 million people in the US... Yeah, they're saying that almost 50% of the US is unemployed... really? REALLY?!?!?! and you believe they give you the truth? If they lie about something like this, something that a novice like me could spend more time writing this post than I did to look for evidence to prove their lies what about the things more complicated? When in all actuality at 9.8% of people being unemployed... that's 30,146,595 people. What a leap from 147 million isn't it? And, if your first response is to say that there are still 30 million people out of work and thats a big number... I will agree with you it is... however, also looking at historical data... back in 2007 when we wern't considered to be that bad off economically... the national unemployement in September of 2007 was 4.7%, which still means 14,458,064 people were not working. So in contrast... there are 15,688,531 people without jobs that had them back in 2007. Just to put things into perspective for ya...
So, the News Media... especially the prominent neo-cons O'Reilly, Hannity, Rush, and Beck.... I'm not sure what their pushing... or really what their problem is... I mean I haven't been paying attention to the news for that long really... only maybe 3-4 years... Before that, I probably would have voted for Bush the first time..... and maybe even the second... Tho... I leaned towards Nader in that election. I would say before that I never cared about politics because they always seemed to say one thing and do another anyway. As I've gotten older, my concerns have become more national and global... I don't consider myself Democrat, or Republican.... In fact, I'm a registered Independent. And if I'm asked which one I lean towards, I say neither. Why? you might ask. Well, its simple really, if you claim to be apart of one party in our two party system... that means you must believe what the party leaders do. I don't, never will, and I just don't want to be associated with any of them.
I've also grown very tired of the ranting the Right has done with regards to the changes Obama wants to do with our Health Care System. "Socialized" as they're calling it. And I love how they constantly criticize Canada's Health Care system and how people will wait for hours to be treated.... How quickly we forget that ours really isn't all that great either, and its getting more and more expensive without the service level matching the rise in cost. Here's the thing tho... how many people in this country file for bankruptcy because of health care bills... don't quote me, but last I remember reading, is well over 50% of them. From what I've also heard, from people its happened to... the bulk of people in this country are just one illness away from being completely broke. I also believe the line in our constitution that people are entitled to Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness... and I don't believe you can achieve these without proper medical care. I know one of the arguments I've heard is that people want to be selfish and not provide care to the "illegals", and to you I say "Why not?". Yes, I know they're here illegally, but lets be honest with each other... this country runs in part because of them. What I say... is illegal or not, employers and employees should be paying taxes on all of them... and some kind of non-citizen, work card should be easily obtained, no questions asked... with that... the employer and employee will need to pay taxes. If someone doesn't have this *easily obtained work card*, then deport them. I don't care much for controlling the borders, but knowing who is in the country is something that should be known and if they have ability to pay into the system that will be taking care of them (Roads,Emergency Health Care, ect..) then they should be paying into it. Also... If we all have health insurance... wouldn't that make it go down? I mean... then insurance companies could no longer use the "preexisting" clauses they love to use, and if you go to the emergency room because your really sick or injured, they cannot deny you care... someone, somewhere pays for that.
I also don't get this fear of "socialism", I mean... I want to keep as much of the money I make as possible... but so many of us spend portions of all of our incomes on the same things anyway... But, really... you can't call what we have currently a "free market" because its not... we have many government granted monopolies that it actually stops alot of the innovation that could be happing. And, if you want an example... look up issues revolving around communications... telco's and cable companies. They're given *our* tax money every year and huge tax breaks to "maintain" infastructure, and yet, our cell phone's are years behind Japan and Europe's. We are 19th for broadband internet penetration and speed... (yeah... Japan's AVERAGE is ~70+Mbit/sec). These are a result of the telco's having so much money that they can stop smaller ISP's from competing.
For lunch today, none of my co-workers were present today so I went to Subway(3197 S Redwood Rd, West Valley, UT), right at noon. The nearest one to my day job is usually busy but I believe the ladies that work behind the counter have the sandwich making down to an art. They've become very efficient at their little piece of the process. That doesn't have much to do with the point just wanted to give them some credit where it's due.
Anyway, it's noon so naturally it's busy and there are probably 15 or more people in line, and the short man(figuratively and actually) in front of me starts complaining after maybe a minute of waiting to his friend/partner/acquaintance, that he doesn't understand why it takes so long to make a sandwich... And follows it up with something more snotty that I didn't quite hear about how he'll pass the time playing cards on his phone. Because of my mood from work I just about told him right there that the bulk of the wait time was because the people in the line ordering don't know what they want(and I believe that to generally be the case for most fast food places... Some are definitely more efficient than others like the ladies at this particular subway), but I decided to take the higher road and prove my point. I timed this asshat in front of me to see just how long he himself took, and no joke he took 53 seconds to order the meat and bread he wanted. Through various changes to the order mid stream and the resulting clarifications the lady behind the counter had to make to make sure she made the order right. I timed it on my iPhone... I knew it
So, I was reading my daily dose of digg and I came across a story about a guy with one very upset windows support "tech" yelling at him in a gas station. And, I have to say, its ridiculous. I mean... its been the case for many years that Microsoft has created a whole ecosystem around fixing their Broken OS(tm). But to say that Open Source is the reason these people are loosing their jobs? Pfft, if they couldn't see that this Open Source(tm) thing wasn't a fad, then they deserve to loose their job. The Technology Field isn't about just one Technology (Broken OS spoken of previously), its about many different ones, that all work together (some better than others... see previous comments) and form what's commonly just referred to as "technology". Which also has a saying, which even those asshats would know, is that its constantly changing, as soon as something makes it to market... its outdated within a month. Just the nature of the beast, and you learn to roll with it. I would also say that being able to roll with it, and not locking myself down to any one particular technology is the reason I've gotten as far as I have in my own career. I definitely have my preferences(see my blog...), but that guy just needs to find his cheese.
I was visiting my normal news sites and came across this article that I thought was quite amusing, entitled: 2008: The Year the Geeks Took Over
And I just wanted to quote a section from the #1 section entitled: "#1. The Election of the First Black(berry) President"
In 2000, George W. Bush was the affable, goofy common man we'd all like to have at our barbecue. Al Gore was a robot, smart and unfeeling as HAL 9000 and just as likely to lock us all out of the bay doors because of some unfathomable calculation made in his computer brain. We went for Bush, and in fact we've been voting for the George W. Bush in that matchup for a couple of centuries, due to an odd misfire in the American brain that associates low intelligence with honesty.
In 2008, that same stage was set again. The white, elderly, self-effacing war hero who boasted that he finished at the bottom of his class in the Academy. The small town beauty queen. A ticket as American as a six shooter.
They were matched up against a young, not-white guy with a foreign name who did not run on his humble roots, could not boast that he was a war hero, who insisted on pronouncing "Pakistan" as "Pah-kis-stahn" and who, by all appearances, would go into a violent seizure if his cell phone or Blackberry were taken away.
Then he threw the switch on an online fundraising machine that drowned the campaign in cash (or more accurately, drowned McCain's campaign with it) and mobilized a high-tech "ground game" that will be studied by every future campaign, volunteers dispatched by advanced databases that tracked every voter.
That's right: he simply out-geeked McCain.
There are other gems in that article and that section as well but I liked those portions enough to reprint them here.
I found the following in a post on Digg... I rather like it so I thought I'd repost it here...
*Create a lower tax environment for foreign companies to build plants in the US, because it is obvious our own companies do not want to stay.
*Allow companies that are in trouble to fail. You will lose a lot of jobs instantly, but they will all be regained with the auctioning off of the assets of the deceased. You want alternative energy? Imagine what can happen it Tesla, Aptera, or THINK get there hands on the plants, machines, and assembly processes of Ford or GM.
*Close almost every overseas military base and reopen some our closed military bases here in the states. Instant increase in sales in the areas of base openings and lower cost for the US tax payer. Need to keep some bases open? Fine, Bahrain can stay since Bahrain gives us a nice kick back for keeping that base open, maybe Okinawa...
*Get rid of a lot of Government departments such as Education, HUD, Susquhenna river basin commission, etc.
*Obviously, the president is not going to toss the FED out the window -- like they should -- so since they are going to keep them, raise rates and keep them high. Because, if they really want to be Keynesians, they need to have VERY high rates when times are good [12% and above], and lower rates if ***** hits the fan. Under REAL Keynesian economics, you are to be a capitalist when times are good, and a socialist TOWARDS YOUR PEOPLE (not companies), when times get bad. Keynesian economics do not state BAIL OUT COMPANIES.
*REMOVE ALL SUBSIDIES! PERIOD! A lot of people say that Alternative Energy Companies should get a subsidy. Well, guess what? Exxon Mobil and Chevron Texaco can count as alternative energy companies just by changing a few bylaws since they both cumulatively own the majority of alternative energy patents out there. I don't my tax dollars going to private companies -- period. If all else fails, please remove the subsidies that you have on the Oil, gas, and coal industries.
*REMOVE ALL COMMODITY related subsidies. A lot of people do not know that American sugar, rice, cotton, etc are subisidies thereby keeping the price of these commodities [and more] high? Billionaire Trader Jim Rogers actually calulated that it'd be cheaper to pay every farmer $100,000 per year for the rest of their lives, give each a Porsche, and pay for their housing for the rest of their lives, and it'd save the government AND US Tax payers 50Million per year.
*Fix restrictions on patents please. If there is anything that should be done on this list it should be this. As matter of fact, this is the number one thing to do. PERIOD!
*Legalize weed and tax it via licensing at the federal level [like you do the alcohol and tobacco companies], then aggressively pursue those who violate the licenses [like you do moonshiners]. Granted, with weed it is harder to do this, and lot of potheads are going to hate me for saying this, but although it comes from the ground, and although it does wonderful things for us, if they legalize it, consider it a gift.
*Allow America to regain our status as the #1 Hemp leader in the world. Hemp Oil, Hemp Clothe, etc., kicks ass and can help create jobs.
*But man, we really need to do a NEW DEAL!!! Fine, take every non violent criminal and put them to work on this thing then. Give them a choice: Max punishment for sentence, or work 1-2 years fixing roads or digging ditches and *****. I'd love to see the CEOs of Lehman and Goldman shoveling asphalt into a road.
TL;DR: Legalize hemp, stop subsidizing *****, create more favorable tax laws to promote foreign companies to open here in states, close almost all overseas military bases, and number one: REDO LAWS ON PATENTS!!!
I watch a lot of documentaries, and read new and such all the time... and the more I do... the more depressed I get. Truth be told, I don't like religion for much the same reasons as it depresses me. No matter how hard I work at life, no matter how successful I become, it just seems that the man is holding me back. Health Insurance costs are rising 2 to 3 times the rate of inflation (which is also rising faster now than any other time in history), we have a war that seems to be never ending and the popular presidential candidates on both the republican and democratic sides don't seem to care about stopping it(I'm for Ron Paul or Dennis Kucinich, which I know they're polar opposites in every way, except they both want to reverse this war we are in, and I believe we could use anyone who would actually follow the constitution).
Anyway, I was just writing this down, because its what I'm feeling at the moment... More later...
My wifes Uncle stopped by the other day to look at my PS3 and decided if he wanted to get one or not... He was asking questions which I'd rather not go into... But the topic of his questions is a common theme I feel among Windows users. Paying for things. I do not nor will I ever condone pirating software/content. (I do however download TopGear which is only shown on the BBC in the UK.... but, thats because I can't buy it here.) And his questions, some of which I completely agree with, others not so much.
Like, I would love to be able to copy a game to a hard drive and run it completely from that and not from the actual disk. When its just me handling the disks or only a few adults... Thats not a big concern for me. However, He has kids and I believe I've even said on this blog, that I would not want kids handling disks if I can help it. Digital copies(iso's) of them would be the much preferred method for them to access the content in my opinion. Something they can't scratch or otherwise ruin. Failing having the storage space required for doing that, I would want to make use of my Fair Use(tm) Rights, and make a backup copy of the disks, and only let them use those. So when they ruin that one, I can throw it away and make another copy for them to slowly destroy. This I believe is a completely legitimate and legal reason to want to perform these actions. But with the idea of being able to do all of these things the illegal ones also exist. Being able to copy dvd's also allows people to rent them for a dollar or so, and make their copy and return the original, then they didn't really "pay" for the copy they now have. To those that do this, I say you are the reason for the copy protection and DRM measures the movie industry (and music) have been trying to put in place. Yes, technology is always going to obsolete their measures, but none the less... features in my PS3 have been crippled simply because people like you exist. I have no problem paying for content, assuming the price is right and its not overly burdensome with DRM. DRM is the reason I've been still buying normal CD's instead of digital forms, because I can always take the CD and rip it to digital forms without DRM. I applaud Apple for bringing DRM free music to iTunes, and if I didn't dislike the interface so much I might actually use it. :) I also however dislike the price tag of certain things. Game prices on the PS3 are actually quite expensive in my mind... being only a casual gamer myself (more on that later...) I love the demo downloads for the PS3 that let me try the games before I actually buy them. It was because of that, I bought Resistance.
Anyway, I guess I'm just not one of those people... I understand the benefits of Free Software, and the importance of paying people for their work. If you don't like paying for software, its time to use the stuff your allowed to use without paying for it. Otherwise, cough up the money.
Ya know, I'm glad I've got the current class I do... I would have never known the exciting world of tech support that all of IT revolves around it would seem. How I ever was unfortunate enough to miss this exciting field of study I will never know, but at least now I get to hear about all the good and bad times to be had doing Tech Support....
shoot me... now...
I should really fix my categories... and add a sarcasm tag...
I've never really liked word processors. It was always the "thing" to use for reports and such. But as far as trying to organize something like a resume? I find its horrible, frustrating and never does what it should. My new solution? I'm not sure, I've heard good things about LaTeX but I'm not entirely sure thats what I want. And I'll probably end up falling back and just writing it in HTML+CSS. That always does what I want... The only problem will be getting that into word format, or PDF. Worst case I can always print to PDF from a web browser, and probably open the file in Open Office to save it to word. I'd prefer a script I could run that converts it to both formats, but thats something I'll have to look into..
In case your wondering, I just like to keep my resume up to date and with my recent job change, it needs some updating. I used a template I liked from MS Office from way back and has worked well for me over the years, but I'm ready for a new one. This time around I'm seeing the benefits of having it in pure HTML form, who knows I might even keep it online and just drop out my address and phone number...
What is it with people? They're willing to give up everything because some situation will "never happen to them". And do it in the name of "freedom", and the "war on terror" or the "war on drugs"? Why? I'm writing about this article: 'No-knock' Searches Get People Killed. This is ludicrous. I'm going to let you in on a little secret. The "ware on drugs" is costing us BILLIONS every year... and guess what? In case you hadn't been able to tell WE STILL HAVE DRUGS! What does that tell you? Its not working. Never has, never will. Face up to it. Whats the best thing to do? Legalize them! Make them a controlled substance, just as prohibition never worked, neither will the war on drugs. Want drug related crime to go down? Legalize. Eliminate the black market for them, making legal controlled methods for distribution and even consumption if you want. You might be surprised that most if not all people would prefer such methods.
And then comes the other issue in that article. Which I've heard the news media talk about before, only in a different light. There was a news broadcast a year or more ago, that said District Attorneys do not like the "CSI Affect". As a result of the popularity of the show, juries were wanting the DA's to present more evidence and wanting a solid conviction, wrapped up all nice and neat like they do in the show. To be honest, I'm dumbfounded by this statement really. To have a DA, who's job it is to convince the jury of a persons guilt. Complain when they aren't convincing the Jury. After all, we are all innocent until proven guilty by our constitution. To make an assumption otherwise is just simply wrong. We are also allowed to protect ourselves from unlawful entry into our homes, *regardless* of who is entering. To have *one* innocent man go to jail is a crime. *EVEN* if that means that 100 guilty men/women go free as a consequence of the DA/police not doing their jobs(And yes I do realize that makes their jobs EXTREMELY hard, and they should be). To have the representatives of law breaking the law themselves and fabricating evidence is truly criminal and they deserve to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
I also dread our next election. Because I know people are tire of Bush and all the crap hes pulled, which means people are probably going to vote Democrat. The sad thing... the Democrats are JUST AS BAD as he is! I've only seen one or two that will actually try to fix the mess we are in. But they are not the popular candidates, because of their candidness to the questions most politicians give pre-fabricated bull-shit answers to.
So, the question becomes "Where do I want to move to? Which country knows the *REAL* meaning of freedom? and patriotism?" Anyone know? because I'm really tired of all of this... it gives me such anxiety.
- UPDATED - April 17th 3:41pm - it appears that the shooter did purchase the 9mm through a gun shop. However, I have also found some of the short 1 act plays that the shooter had written. While some may claim that they're sick and twisted. I would rather argue that they're are quite immature for the age. The story as its written seems much more junior high to me. Tho, possibly some type of insite into his own persona... Thinking he definitely needed some type of psychiatric care.
As, most of you have undoubtedly heard, there has been an awful tragedy at Virgina Tech, and my heart goes out to the families of the victims.
Those feelings aside... I'm again, infuriated by the responses people have been giving with regard to the situation. Saying that VT "should have locked down the school and notified students of the situation". Is the scale of this type of claim really that far above and beyond peoples comprehension? The sheer logistics of such a feat are mind boggling. To say that after what appeared to be an isolated incident in the first shooting with no information or evidence leading anyone to believe there would be another shooting 2 hours later, they should have locked down the whole school!?!? And that they should have warned everyone? Again... if this was say Manhattan, I don't think anyone would be able to walk on city streets... EVER. If they had to follow the same guidelines... A normal High School, is entirely different as its usually very controlled with one large building and maybe a few smaller ones just around the perimeter and usually less than 10 buildings total, and <5,000 students. This was an open College campus with a mix of residential and commercial intermixed to boot. With over 40,000 students alone. Its would be kind of hard to lock down over 700 buildings!
Why is it that when a tragedy strikes... we want to pawn off the responsibility of it onto "things" and "entities" instead of the person/people that committed the acts? I hear the cult of Scientology is saying that the shooter was probably over medicated on anti-depressants, as they had also "discovered" that is what caused Columbine. Yeah... you read that right... Or, VT didn't do enough to warn people, or they didn't shut down the campus... This is all BS... honestly. Don't get me started on Gun control, as it had nothing to do with it.
I've seen reports that the serial numbers were filed off of the guns.... why would the shooter, prior to doing what he did, file off the serial numbers to his guns? Quick answer is he wouldn't.. why bother, he went in knowing he was probably going to die. By his own hand or the police or someone else with a gun, I'm pretty sure he knew he wouldn't come out of it alive(Also, none of the other tragedies have ever had filed off serial numbers). So again, why were these ones filed off? The simple answer was that is the way they were when he got them. Which also means he did not obtain them legally. So more strict gun laws WOULD NOT HAVE PREVENTED THIS FROM HAPPENING. Its been said many times, but I still think it needs repeating: The only thing stricter gun laws do, is prevent lawful citizens from obtaining guns. Making guns illegal will mean only criminals will have guns. If anything, we should be encouraging more lawful citizens to carry guns.
Which leads to the latest whipping boy... Video Games. Jack Thompson was very quick to exploit this tragedy for his own agenda against the Video Game Industry. My argument is the same as I've written about before. Look at the statistics... Look at the TENS of MILLIONS of gamers in the US alone. Then look at the numbers of these types of incidents(I'm not trying to discount them, just trying to bring a little perspective with regards to gamers).... If Video Games were training our youth and even those that have aged into their mid 30's now... we are looking at MUCH less than 1% of possible gamers.
I don't buy it, any of it. Why the media allow the lunatics to spread their own propaganda without ANY evidence what-so-ever is beyond me. As bad as that is... People believe it... I don't know which is worse... more and more, The movie Idiocracy becomes more and more ironic... Which seems to be leading us more towards that of V for Vendetta. The police state everyone seems to think is a great idea, in order to feel "safe".
I believe it was Ben Franklin (on of our founding fathers) that said:
He that would give up liberty for a little temporary safety, deserves neither.
My brother came home last week from his LDS mission in South Africa, and he would continually remark that we(being people living in the US) don't know how well we have it. Which to some degree I agree with him. However, not everyone in this country would agree. I'm not trying to downplay the situations that people live in in South Africa, or any other 3rd world country for that matter. I'm sure its not something I would like to live with either, and I am grateful for the thing with which I am privileged to. This however does not mean I should just take what I have and be "happy". Wanting more, wanting things to be better is a very worthwhile cause. My brother had made the claim that I shouldn't be so hard and critical of our government and our current leadership, because I don't have to put bars on my windows and worry about someone shooting through my windows. I *very* much disagree. As I said, yes I understand that South Africa, in most parts, is very much a 3rd world country, and here I am "living the dream" in the U.S. of A.. The current self proclaimed leader in this world of ours. Heres where I'm comming from, comparing the US, to South Africa is like comparing apples and oranges, they are NOT the same thing. Because of the history surrounding each country and the forms of government in place and the like... the two countries are *VERY* different. In order to make any kind of fair comparisons, you need to look at countries where there are more things that are alike than are different. The so called "1st world countries". This is how they gain these labels in the first place. And when ranking 1st world countries, guess where the US falls, in all the areas that should matter? Dead LAST. Sure, we still top the charts in military power and expertise, but this is also coming into question and China is the up and coming star in this arena. But we are still the only 1st world nation that does not give Health Care to every citizen of this country. Our public education system is failing miserably and lieing about it to cover up this fact. And something I'm more inclined to follow, we are also falling way behind in Broadband connections for our citizens as well. America isn't much for being the land of the free like it used to be. No instead we want to keep people from entering this country, we want to hold people indefinitely and without charging them with any crime, and then torture them so we can charge them with a crime. We want to award multi-billion dollar government contracts to companies that our Vice President has a stock in. We want to have wiretaps and listen in on phone calls without warrants. All of this is *against our constitution*. The foundation of this country! And the american people just blindly accept this, because we feel we need protection... from what? Yes, 9/11 was a tragedy. It resulted from what I can tell, was our leadership asleep at the helm. Now, they're asking us to give up our freedoms that this country was founded on, for some pseudo safety. Our elected officials are running away with billions and our freedoms, and all the American people seem to care about is who's the real father of Anna Nicole's baby! *WTF!*
Look, I'm not a fan of the government (just read my blog), and I'm definitely not a fan of more Government Regulation. However, Net Neutrality *IS* a good thing. Its purpose is to force the monopolistic powers that be, to play fair with their smaller and more innovative and dynamic competitors. Republicans are dead against it, (and why wouldn't they be, the lobbyists that give them money/perks tell them to be) and then the far left Liberals are against it because they can't see past this being more unnecessary government regulation. However, what they can't seem to really understand is that the bill (S. 215) Internet Freedom Preservation Act doesn't change much over what is currently going on (far as we/I know anyway). It calls for packets to be equally prioritized regardless of their destination. The exact verbage from the bill goes like this:
`(4) enable any content, application, or service made available via the Internet to be offered, provided, or posted on a basis that--
`(A) is reasonable and nondiscriminatory, including with respect to quality of service, access, speed, and bandwidth; `(B) is at least equivalent to the access, speed, quality of service, and bandwidth that such broadband service provider offers to affiliated content, applications, or services made available via the public Internet into the network of such broadband service provider; and `(C) does not impose a charge on the basis of the type of content, applications, or services made available via the Internet into the network of such broadband service provider;
Now, I'm not a Lawyer (INAL), but this is saying that if an Internat/Broadband Service Provider(ISP) were to also have a VoIP service (Like my provider, Comcast). This forbids them from giving their VoIP service preferential treatment to the VoIP service that could be offered by others (eg: Vonage[my provider], Packet8 and many others). This *DOES NOT* forbid them from performing Quality of Service (QoS) on VoIP traffic, but it *does forbid them from only performing QoS on their own VoIP service*. Now, this is exactly the type of agreement we can live with, as it treats all VoIP providers fairly. I also understand that ISP's have been doing some forms of QoS on bittorrent traffic, as they say it would keep normal users from doing normal things if they didn't. This is allowed under the proposed bill, as long as *ALL* bittorrent traffic is treated the same. However, I do believe these types of issues will become more important as time moves on. It will eventually become a selling point (or maybe a reason not to buy from one provider over another) depending on what type of traffic is or isn't prioritized.
If anything this bill didn't quite go far enough as I feel that ISP's should have to properly and accurately make available to the public at large what type of prioritization they are doing. As then consumers could be fully informed as to what is going on behind the curtain and make their purchasing choices based on that. Not that they have alot of choices at the moment, but thats a whole other entry.... (see Utopia)
I came across a speech done by the Author Michael Crichton about global warming, its called "Our environmental future". I must admit that I personally haven't done much looking into things with regard to global warming. However, I did read his speech and I must say he says what I've been thinking for a while. I am now, more than ever, along the lines of getting rid of our fossil fuel dependence and developing alternative renewable energy sources. I will be buying a bunch of LED light bulb replacements(I honestly can't stand florescent, they give me a headache) as the ones that came with our house burn out. My choice of vehicles has always leaned toward gas efficiency and will continue. If only Lotus would release their prototype electric I think I'd convert completely. I'm also hopeful solar panels will come down in price as right now they just don't make economic sense(I'm not rich after all). As I would love to be able to cut my electric bill at least in half.
I'm going though my car mode again. By that, I mean I'm constantly looking at cars, and thinking about if I were to buy one which would it be? With that I'm also back into my VW GTI stage again, where I really want one. Yet part of me doesn't want to give up having all wheel drive. Enter the VW R32, this car is amazing, its the GTI with a 3.2 Liter VR6 and the Audi Quattro all wheel drive. How could you go wrong? I don't think you could... but the kicker is its not a cheap car :( They only made them in '04 and '05 and I'm seeing '04's for around 26k+ Which is still way out of my price range. I could go for an Audi A4 and get close to the same car... but it still wouldn't be the same, as they are not hatch backs. Tho I do like the wagon A4. I'm just kinda torn. As a '02 - '03 GTI VR6 is in my price range but doesn't have the all wheel drive. Or I do like the WRX as well. Couldn't afford the STi, but I can probably find a sup'd up WRX that would be close to the STi performance wise in the same price range. But again, no hatchback, and the wagon version is also appealing (given a certain amount of aftermarket parts). However then I would also have to get used to the feeling I have when sitting in a WRX. Don't get me wrong I love them, however I feel like a little kid when I sit in them... and not in a good way... There is alot of head room in a WRX, and since I'm not that tall, it makes me feel even shorter. But perhaps I've just grown accustomed to tighter fitting cars with my first car a '91 Maxima, and my current car the '98 Civic. I don't get the same feeling when I sit in an Evo or GTI, so that makes me resist wanting to just "get used to it". Not sure what I'll do just yet, and I am probably going to wait until Elissa graduates from school anyway before I make any changes to the current status quo.
Wow... its been a month since my last post... I have a couple posts sorta written in my drafts but, they're mostly political since we had elections earlier this month. I'm sad to say my vote didn't seem to matter much. The unbelievably retarded Orrin Hatch won again. Man, I really don't like him. So I've been trying to lay low a bit and not let politics bug me... which doesn't seem to work for long... there's always something going on and its outragous most of the time. Lately however the tech scene's been the same. Novell struck a deal with the devil (Microsoft) over "intellectual property". The biggest scam of this century. Ballmer is out in force with his FUD machine, making even more claims of IP in Linux that MS owns... We'll see, cause after all, if they had something, I'm sure it would have surfaced in the SCO ordeal. Which was also obvious that there wasn't anything. The only thing that could be possibly infringing is the use of Mono (aka C#/.Net). Which I don't think is going to bear much for MS either... I mean, everything thats been implemented in Mono as far as I'm aware, is whats been published by MS and with that... goes to public domain. However i'm not a lawyer so don't quote me on that :) Either way, I could do without mono as I dont' think its really that nessisary and Fedora is probably going to pull anything written in mono out of the distribution. Life goes on tho.
Well, I'm going to wrap this up... its really late and I need to go check on the turkey I have cooking in the oven...
I'm refering to a post about a school thats banning the game of "tag" and other contact games children might like to play during recess the story is linked up on slashdot. I mean really... what is this world comming to? Well, not really the world, but the US... and from what I've heard... England. We both seem to be responding to this notion that these things are bad for children. I, however, believe that this will screw them up even more, and be bad for the economy as a whole. "Playing it safe" is not a mantra that should be followed in all circumstances. This stifles creativity, individuality, and ingenuity. In order to advance as an individual, and as a society, you need people that are free thinkers, you need people that will "think outside the box", they need to challenge the system. How are they supposed to do this when adults have pre-thought their paths for them every step they make? I understand that they are only trying to protect them from getting hurt, but that is all part of life. There is pain in life, and if you protect them from making the little mistakes here and there preventing them from having to deal with minor consequences of those mistakes, what happens when the big ones come along? Or it then becomes their responcibility to govern others? (such as they themselves becoming parents)
Anything that stops or tries to prevent these problems, inhibits free thinking which will become a very bad thing. Staying aware and growing with the world around you is the only thing that will keep us alive. We need to change and adapt to the changing world around us, or become extinct. It is the way the world is, and the way it always has been.
Questioning, and challenging the world around me, the "norms" so to speak. Growing and changing as I learn more about the world around me, not immediately trusting anything until I've looked into it enough to make a decision about it. I don't know of any other way to really live to be honest. Doing anything less makes you a lemming, with no right to complain and no right to offer guidance, and not much of a life in the first place.
While I enjoy my quotes that I have displaying randomly in the top left corner of this blog this one doesn't particularly fall into the criteria I use for adding quotes to that list. Least that is my current thinking... I may descide down the road it does and add it to the list. Will have to think on that. Anyway, I came accross this quote while reading Ciscos "Top-Down Network Design". On the first page of the first chapter they have a quote from a man I take some inspiration from, Albert Einstein, which reads:
"The world we've made as a result of the level of thinking we have done thus far creates problems that we cannot solve at the same level at which we created them."
Anyway, I love it, as it says exactly what I've been thinking recently... Why do we keep making the same mistakes over and over, throughout history. My thoughts are directed towards some thoughts I've had about various subjects, namely the continuing claims and now a law suite blaming the makers of "Grand Theft Auto" for a shooting back in 2004. And our current (retarded) presidency, claiming that torture is OK at any level, because "people watch [the tv show] 24, where the character Jack Bauer tortures people" thus making it OK. This is insane, its like we're moving backwards in time, but thats still not the end of it. They're also talking about making it OK to allow imprisonment without a fair trial and without being told what your being put on trial for.
This is nothing but fear mongering, and what bothers me more, is that people are ok with this because they're naive enough to believe that this will only be used against "terrorists". Just wait, if this goes through, the only thing that separates each and every one of us from being "terrorists" is our name being on a list. What would it take to get put on a list? Well, as someone who thought he had freedom of speech in this wonderful country of ours, and thought he'd express that freedom by writing "Kip Hawley is an idiot" on a bag that was search by the TSA before a flight. He was then detained for 25 minutes and told he no longer had freedom of speech while in the presence of the TSA!?! WTF!
Yes, video games can be violent. We as humans *ARE* violent. Don't believe me? Look at history. Every form of communication humans have created during our existance on this planet, has depicted... wait for it... VIOLENCE. From the earliest cave drawings, to even religious works such as the Bible. Whats causing all the commotion now? The guy in Montreal who *gasp* played violent video games. Ask any one on the street, especially the younger demographic, and I'd beat it'd be easier to count those that haven't played some form of violent video game in their life. Does this make them violent? I'd say that that in and of itself does not. Its typically other factors that lead to the tragedy's such as the latest Montreal incident. The fact that he played these games is no more than a coincident. I mean, he could just as well of eaten at a McDonalds and drove a Ford, and someone honked his horn at him on the freeway just before he did what he did. Could they have caused this? Not likely, but does that mean we need to ban any of these things too? When does it stop? When can we stop blaming x product, and say blame the person that committed such acts? Where does personal accountablity start? After all that is what is really the problem. No one wants to accept their own responcibilities. Our rights (especially as Americans and any country that modeled their own constitutions after our original constitution [our changes to it since i'm less sure about]) have the freedom to do as we wish. The only reason for government intrusion, and the purpose of the government at that point... is to prevent say one persons freedom to shoot a cannon in an area that would affect another persons life or property. If said person had enough land and a cannon that they wished to shoot, and it all stayed within their property then they by all means nessisary should be allowed to exibit their freedom and shoot that cannon to their hearts content.
The point being of coarse freedom. Every decade or so has their own explination for violence, rock 'n roll, and Elvis were two in the last century that were used to explain violence and crime. However, I'm just sick that even after all of the unfounded aligations and the continuing attempts to try to limit the sale of video games, which are struck down because of violations to our right for freedom of speech. Video games are a form of art, art depicts life, and life is violent. Don't like it? Don't buy it. Nuf said.
The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not sufficient warrant. -- John Stuart Mill(1806 - 1873)
All I can say is "good". I mean honestly... there are much more important issues going on in our Nation alone, than to give this issue another thought. Its pointless. Even more dissapointing however, is the show of how little some of our elected officials know and understand what our country is about. Our founding fathers often spoke out against a "Direct democracy", because it would give to much power to the majority, allowing them to squander the rights of the minority. Which is exactly what this country was founded on. Our ansestors came to America because they were being persecuted and their rights squandered because of the majority, and now the "christian" majority are trying to do that again to other minorities. You don't have to agree with the lifestyle of the minority(or anyone else for that matter), its your right not to. Using your status as the majority to take away rights from a minority just because you find morally wrong? What? Come on, and going as far as to put a descriminating clause in the Constitution? Its purpose is to give *WE THE PEOPLE* our rights to protect us from the government! Here you are trying to turn it against a minority. You should be ashamed. It will *NOT* affect you one bit if a gay or lesbian couple are able to get married. I mean, whats the chances of divorce now between straight couples? Nor does it mean the nation will become over run with gay and lesbians (because we all know straight people only breed straight children right?). Nor does it mean you will have to allow these marriages in your temples, churches or synagogues, because these places are not currently required to marry any and all straight couples! These are religious places and as such have the protections to prevent the government from doing these things! Ya know, that other clause you religious groups like to grip about, "Separation between church and state". In this case it is working towards your cause.
In any case I want to make one comment about the article I linked above:
"Forty-five states have passed laws or constitutional amendments defining marriage between a man and a woman, yet non- elected, liberally motivated judges have overturned the voice of the American people time after time," said House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) in a statement.
"It's unfortunate that more than a majority of democrats today have sided with these liberal judges and voted against this measure," Hastert said.
No, Speaker Hastert, its unfortunate that you think that way. You seemingly act like you know very little about the history of this nation and the reasons it was founded in the first place. As I've previously stated, we are a "Democratic Republic" for a very specific reason. So the rights of the few can not be squandered by the many. After all, that is why our ancestors left their homes and everything they had and wanted to come to America in the first place. Ya know? The Land of the Free?
I know I've written about this alot, mostly because I'm very concerned about it. I for one do not want the big ISP/Content provides such as the telco's and cable companies making toll roads on the internet. As such, I was of the opinion that a Net Neutrality law would restrict that. However, after watching some very funny bits from the Daily Show, and actually seeing these people I'm trusting to create this law... I've completely lost all faith that they could ever do it right and I'd rather have to deal with the technical pieces and public awareness pieces of the situation instead of trying to get them to fix their broken law. I was reading Pete Ashdown's Blog today and noticed he has written about a new opinion about the whole debate.
Which comes from the point of view of "labeling". As Pete puts it:
labeling laws are a good way to inform the consumer and keep economic playing fields level. For instance, the “juice†vs. “cocktail†labeling law informs purchasers of the content of their purchase, but keeps regulation low.
This works with Net Neutrality by really defining for everyone what the "Internet" really is. Up until recencently I've never really thought about it in the terms needed to define it as a label, but I've always believed what it stood for and why it was good. The Internet is the network to connect networks, or an internetwork connecting networks. Meaning its existance is mearly for connecting two ends together, or "A World of Ends". Any attempt to filter, and "limit" this world has changed what it is, and shouldn't be labeled an "Internet connection" but something else. Forcing this type of labeling seems like the ideal solution if you ask me(and one I had never considered), which Pete also endorced. I must say I agree and will in turn continue to support Pete. He has my vote!
Also the organization that is backing this new idea is located at: http://dpsproject.com/ and they also have my support.
How can the human race survive the next 100 years? thats the question... what do you think? Being my blog, I'll write what I think. My simple answer is "Same way we've survived the last X years". We humans naturally have an intense desire to survive and we will at all cost. That desire will never change.
Dr. Hawking implies that our civil unrest with each other and with nature, will be what kills us off unless we do something. Which is definately a valid point. Why we as humans insist on performing gestapo tactics on each other is beyond me. I'm not just implying tactics of the current so called "terrorists". After all they are just standing up for what they believe... Why they're so radical about it is where they cross the line, but they aren't the only ones that do such things. Most (or dare I say all? to my knowledge at least) religions perform some of these same actions, either directly or indirectly, with and without malace. These religions may not do it on purpose, but its one thing after another, people connect things that they shouldn't and it all gets taken out of porportion, and out of control. This is where we have problems, people dissagree (which is natural and a given because of circumstance), which is where things should stop. Its OK to dissagree with someone, however because you believe your opinion is "right", it does *not* give you the right to force it apon someone else. Before you become cynical with that comment wait and let me finish. As a citizen of the United States of America, I have to say I've become more and more impressed by the sheer wisdom and forethought in our Constitution. Our founding fathers where very intelligent and they added the very excellent clause as to what a persons rights are. Citizens(however I would much rather consider it as a Human Right) have the *RIGHT* to our own Life, Liberty, and Pursuit of Happiness. The only time this is (or should be) overruled is by someone elses Rights. This is where you cynical people come back into play. As any of your cynical comments will usually violate atleast one of those three words which are given to every person(or should be...) in this country(and more utopian like, the World). This is a moto I'm trying to truely adapt into the way I think, that if something doesn't affect me personally? what do I care, or have any business in, what you do? As such, I don't think there should be any laws or amendments to our consitution that do anything to counter those Rights. Our founding fathers knew these things from the begining, they used history as their teacher... Now why can't we do the same?
For those that don't know, the "Last Mile" refers to the connection from the end user(consumer's residence) to their ISP's backbone. This is also the portion that the Net Neutrality debate is talking about. There was recently an article in the column I, Cringely on pbs.org, talking about a "solution" to this whole debate. A thought I believe I've mentioned previously on one of my rants. Essentually the article is calling for a community owned Fiber To The Home (FTTH) network, paid for by the home owners in the community. While I personally agree with this, this also would be impracticle in more urban areas, where better wireless access would be much easier and cheaper. As I've said before I would love to have UTOPIA in my house. It simply is a FTTH infastructure built and backed by the City. Its operated by a non-profit organization, and they allow anyone to provide services over it. However, since the city I bought my house in, did not support UTOPIA when they were looking for cities sign up. I'm not sure when the next time will be that they can join, and if its a long way away, I'm going to look at what it would take to just get the community I live in to join up with UTOPIA, since I never thought that just a community could before. Which also reminds me... I need to look up the transcripts from any and all meetings the city counsil had with regard to UTOPIA.. So I know who not to vote for come elections.
I support UTOPIA just as I support the city maintaining city roads. The city controlling the fiber infastructure is the best solution because that puts the city council immediately in control of the "last mile" of their infastructure, and could allow the citizens to vote to keep it current and working. Also allowing as many providers as they feel they need to keep up competition. This situation also provides exactly what the anti-net neutrality people want to do, let the market figure it out itself without legislation. However, this still doesn't account for the credits and such that the Telco's were given to "upgrade" the nations infastructure. And maybe we should make them help pay the cities to pay for this community owned FTTH.
Forgive me, as I've been on rants in my recent posts... and this is yet another one. The purpose of this one however, is because I've actually found some data showing what I've been thinking all along about this whole crisis called "Global Warming"
For years the media and environmentalists have been clammoring about global warming and if we don't stop poluting we're all going to die or something. However, their story has never made sense. They use reports that say that the water level in the ocean is rising because of melting ice caps, and in particular they said that in Iceland, the water is now at a level it was at 100,000 years ago or so (forgive me if the number is wrong, I don't have an article to double check, but the message essentually is that the current level the ocean is at... was also a previous level) Ok.... so the water level is rising.... so we should all be running scared right? Wrong, the real information is also in that statement, just at the end of it... this is *not* the first time the ocean was at its current level. The difference between now and when it last was at its current level? An ICE AGE! So... the earth is essentually still just warming up from the *last ice age*. Hardly a reason to panic. This was my thought, and heres some reasearch to back me up: Is the global climate changing? Is the world getting warmer? They have core samples from Antartica that say essentually the same thing... and from what they're seeing, and if history will continue to repeat itself... we currently are on the tail end of a warm spell. This makes sense, all the doomsday media doesn't.
This is *NOT* to say I don't agree with finding alternative fuels. Being dependant on oil is not a good thing, nor am I trying to say the polution we put into the atmosphere doesn't harm anything. What I am saying is that Global Warming is NOT being caused soley by us. Our polution certainly does contribute, but so does a volcano. I support measures taken by our government to improve funding for research that leads to alternative fuel sources soley for the sake of having alternative fuel sources. If we lessen or even eliminate our harmful impact on the environment in the process, that is "icing on the cake".
For those that haven't heard about the issue, at the heart of it, the Bells are wanting more money. Currently they don't think they would be able to get more money of of Joe consumer without a huge outcry (and they would be correct), so they're looking for other places. They are wanting to charge (for instance) Google, for "improved service" or since they view themselves as providing Googles customers, if they don't want degraded service, they should pay up(ie: they're threatening to purposely degrade their customers access to Google, if Google doesn't pay up). Now, this is simply absurd... Google already pays their uplink providers (they have multiple), for an internet connection. You, the consumer, pay your internet connection fees... now why should you have to pay extra to connect to say Google? (I know, technically it would be Google paying... but believe me it all comes back around)
I know what your saying... you shouldn't have to right? Right! you definately shouldn't have to. The bells are making plenty of money (record profits from what I hear...) Oh and they're not the only ones all for this Tier'd Internet, Cisco among others are all for it. And why wouldn't they be? If the Bell's have to upgrade network equipment to micromanage everyones bandwidth usage... Yeah thats right, it all comes down to money, but doesn't everything?
Anyway, on to the purpose of why I'm writing. I came across a quick writeup from a group called "tele-truth" their mission is simply: "TeleTruth is a national, independent, customer advocacy group, dedicated to fixing the problems in telecommunications -- from customer overcharging and harm to competitors, to the customer issues surrounding Broadband deployment and competition." Their website can be found at: http://www.teletruth.org. They have written a book that looks awfully interesting and a quick Ad/summery for it can be found here: $200 Billion Broadband Scandal. Which poses some interesting questions... I would definately need to read more on the subject to know for sure, but at first sight I'm more apt to believe them. After seeing how hard Qwest fought against UTOPIA. When it was the hot topic here... And the rumors I hear of Qwest having lots of dark fiber laying in the ground. And nothing forbid Qwest from providing service on Utopia either... they just had to play on the same playing field as everyone else. Its sad really... All the more reason why I *hate* Qwest. So far, they haven't gotten any money from me, and I'm going to keep it that way as long as I can.
I will start pushing for Utopia in South Jordan as thats where I will be living now, and Net Neutrality is in the best interests of the people and for the people! But don't just believe what I say... do the research for yourself so you will know exactly why... but if you must just believe something... you can believe me, I won't mind :)
For the last couple years I've been wanting to move my career towards network and systems architecture, which I think of it as "Infrastructure Architecture", and I'm just starting to figure out what type of a background do I need to beable to carry such a title. I get fairly bored when studing routers and switches to be honest, which is why I really haven't wanted to learn or study them very closely before. However, now that I have a much better understanding of my likes and dislikes, and even some (alteast perceived) understanding of the direction of the computer industry in general. Instead of learning more of the unix's I'm focusing more on network related technologies and sticking with Linux as the network OS. So my next move will be Cisco certifications. First up will be the CCNA which I've studied alot already and having some experience with cisco routers and switches so far its alot easier to remember than when I was studying originally... not sure if its because back then I really wanted my RHCE more than anything else or if I was more into becomming a Sys Admin than a Network Admin/Engineer. Either way, its making this time around alot easier ;) Next up after that will be what I'm really interested in which would be the CCDA, or the Cisco Certified Design Associate. Since, like I already said, actually administering routers and switches is somewhat of a bore to me, but networks in general I find very interesting. Designing them is definately intriguing. Hopefully that gets me off on the track I really want, and maybe I'll even go for the CCDP after that. And somewhere in the middle of all of this will be some VoIP. Anyway, thats the current plan thought I'd lay it all out for myself just because I can.
There were some posts that came across the PLUG (http://plug.org) list the other day about a presentation given by Pete Ashdown (http://peteashdown.org) who is running for US Senate this year, against the long standing Orin Hatch(who I really despise). Anyway the discussion started up because a few (or maybe many?) of the plug members (most are LDS) disagree'd with his views on pornography. And were even going as far as to say that it should be treated as a drug?!? Don't get me wrong, I don't participate, nor contribute any money to the industry as I don't like it. However, going so far as to make it against the law or saying the government should step in to control it? That's going overboard, and it really upsets me. Utah is a very conservative state, thus it is also a very republican state (hence why Mr. Hatch has been in office so long...). The one thing I don't understand as its very contradictory, is Republicans always seem to want and give tax cuts, but they also want the government to step in and start controlling things that they feel are more and more offensive? This *requires* money people! You can't have your tax cuts and the government doing more "filtering for the bettering of our morals". Its one or the other... then they will also complain about the lack of budgets for education and want MORE tax credits given so they can send their kids to private schools... All of this makes me wonder... is it because most republicans, which I believe are usually religious people, know the moral standards they are supposed to have, but have a hard time keeping them selves on track? So their solution is it to make things against the law or harder to access because of laws, thus removing most of the blame on their own lack of will power?
I don't understand it... I've grown up here in "Happy Valley" and of the LDS faith, and for as long as I remember all the lessons I had while growing up were about acceptance of other faiths and beliefs. Sure we believe we are "correct" but... so do terrorists fighting for Allah? My point being that who are we to judge what is right for the rest of the world. If someone wants to listen you your message, that is their right. If they don't, that is also their right. The same goes with morals... If they want to abide by your morals... that is their right and they probably will. If they don't want to, that is also their right, so why do most (at least those that I've read and associated with) believe that it is their moral and ethical responsibility to make the rest of the world abide by their moral and ethical standings. As I said before I'm not a patron of porn myself. I find it repulsive. I disagree very much the thought of government regulation however. Because it'll be a lot of wasted money without much benefit. The solution is simple people... If you don't like it, *DON'T BUY IT*. I know, it means you'll have to practice some will power, and yes it also means your going to have to *TALK TO YOUR CHILDREN* about such things. You can't rely on this nice community to do it for you. You should be doing this anyway! The world can be a big bad place, if you let it. Ignoring that fact does not make it go away, creating laws for it won't stop it either. Keeping things out in the open is always the best way to handle things, because as soon as it goes underground you'll loose all control.
I get so aggravated over this... If you couldn't tell...
I don't profess to be any kind of network design guru or anything, but I do consider myself very familiar with routing and protocol concepts. I am just wondering why is it that I feel like most people are inept when its their job to do such things? I read alot, and I understand what I read, to the point I could regurgitate what I've read, and even apply it to other situations I have encountered. Am I asking to much to expect other people to understand network concepts better than I do when its their chosen profession? I've never been in the position to actually design a network, and I'm wondering if budget really forces these (bad) dicisions... which I don't quite understand either... because if the said engineer knew how networks were supposed to be designed... I don't think they would accept much less... they might go buy cheaper (used?) hardware if it came down to money. I just don't see a network engineer building a network in an adhoc fashion soley becasue of lack of funds.
I could be completely wrong in these assumptions, as these are just thoughts I've been contemplating lately(and even over the last couple years)... I am taking a Cisco class at school, and I've just had network design on my mind. The class is supposed to be for the CCNA (Cisco Certified Network Administrator, or is it Associate?), but I'm more inclined to want to study for a CCDA (Cisco Certified Design Associate?) as administering network hardware really isn't something I want to do, but knowing how critical the position is, I feel I really should know alot of what is going on in that area(atleast in a higher view). Especially since architecture is my overall carreer goal. I love designing, and not to be cocky, or self promoting, but I feel I really have a nack for seeing the bigger picture, forward thinking that allows me to think through a situation and picture all these logical concepts that pertain to network and systems design, making sure its scalible and practical for future maintanance. I guess the real key now is to get other people to see that I am capable of architecture and design of systems and networks... Yet I find some people get threatened by me if I start getting to close to their "baby" and challenging their decisions about it. I must say I loved how my old boss handled this... he saw (or atleast started to) my potential, that I do have a nack for it, and even asked for my opinion on how I would redesign a web based photo editing product they were marketing(it is based on PHP)... I explained what I would do, he understood and liked it... then it seemed he did some research on his own and liked it even more after he understoop PHP better.
Anyway, I was just making some observations and expressing some thoughts I've been having lately... I should have more to write by the weekend to...
My little brother who's blog is availible at http://shawn.metauser.net, told me that he's unable to access my blog(at school), and his because of it. Says its blocked because its labeled as a "Forum/Discussion Board" web site. Which it is I suppose, blogs kind of stemmed from this. I'm not so much upset at the label their web filtering software has given my site. I'm more upset at the fact that they're blocking those types of sites period. This is an education institution, their *job* is to teach kids how to learn. Learning is a two way street, in that for kids to learn they need to interact, and blocking web sites that inspire this interaction inhibits the learning of the student. In all honesty, I wouldn't be where I am today without this interaction. Admitidly, I'm not very social in person(the reasons for that I'll leave for another day), online however, I'm constantly reading through posts of personal opinions, learning from posts of others experiences in whatever subject has my interests at the moment. I also used to frequent IRC channels, and currently read through hundreds of emails a week from various mailing lists, replying when I have something to contribute. These things are what makes the internet community work, they're the meaning of making the world flat again. Allowing people to communicate with anyone, anywhere in the world, without ever leaving the classroom. Socializing and new ways of thinking, expanding the minds and possibilities for anyone that learns how useful these mediums of communication can be. Why are educators compeled to remove these possibilities from students? Because they need to be protected from porn? Heres a thought: Teach them of the Internets possibilities and show it to them. I must admit that I don't think its the kids that have trouble realizing this. Its the educators. Living in such a conservative state most adults here seem to fear change, fear things they don't understand. Resulting in blocking everything out of their lives that *might* harm them. However, kids arn't this fearful, and because these *adults* refuse to learn anymore about this technology than they absolutely have to, because its set in their minds that its evil and their kids shouldn't be on it at all. Kids therefore are becomming the teachers, they're learning more about this technology than the adults because they are open to it. Kids are then able to get around any kind of counter-measures an adult would put in place to protect their kids from some of the evil things of this world.
Kids, to some degree, early in their development need to be protected and taught right and wrong through the values of the parents. Only as they mature should they be exposed to more and more of the world around them(this will happen with or without the guidance of the parent, so a note to parents, follow along this path *with* your *student*). However, when the students understanding of this technology exceeds that of the teacher, when the proper grounding hasn't yet been finnished, who then is the student going to learn from? Do you, the teacher, understand that making a stand and sticking your head in the sand is not going to stop the student's curiosity? Life is about learning and growing, if you ever stop this process, or try to stop someone elses, you *will* loose.
In a recent unsealing of a court document in the Microsoft vs. Google lawsuit(I mean who isn't in a law suite against microsoft?), over the hiring of Kai-Fu Lee. In a swarn statement made by Mark Lucovsky, Ballmer is being accused of threatening employees not to leave for Google. Heres the quote:
"At that point, Mr. Ballmer picked up a chair and threw it across the room hitting a table in his office," Lucovosky recounted, adding that Ballmer then launched into a tirade about Google CEO Eric Schmidt. "I'm going to f***ing bury that guy, I have done it before, and I will do it again. I'm going to f***ing kill Google."
Now... I've never been found of Microsoft, nor have I ever been impressed by Steve Ballmer as a person with character. This, however, is not a display that should *EVER* be presented in front of employee's... no matter who you are. I can understand the fact that hes upset...(he probably feels that way alot lately...) but to start acting like this in front of an employee that is leaving for another company. (the fact that he despises Google is beside the point) Is very unprofessional. In a statement issued by Ballmer about the incident:
"Mark Lucovsky's account of our conversation last November is a gross exaggeration of what actually took place," Ballmer said. "Mark's decision to leave was disappointing and I urged him strongly to change his mind. But his characterization of that meeting is not accurate."
Which it might be, though it might not as well. Since it is Ballmer that has the most at risk if it is true. Also notice the wording, he doesn't specifically deny throwing the chair or having a tantrum... I'll let you make your own conclusion however.
In the wake of Katrina, something that will be remembered for many years to come. I've been doing a bit of reading. Doc Searls wrote on the effectiveness of the "World Live Web". How Blogs, Instant Messages, Forums and the like are changing the world as we know it. Everything becomes a bit more real when you read personal accounts like This one(Warning, it is somewhat graphic and may be upsetting to you). CNN and the likes of other news media seem to skip all of the real things that happen under these situations. Leaves one to only hope for the best and pray for God to be with these people in their time of need.
I started school last Monday (June the 6th) for a degree in "Computer Networking"(The actual name of the degree escapes me at the moment, but I'll correct it later). My first and only class currently is titled "Strategies For Success". Which is the reason for this post. So far the basic plot of the class is around the word "scotoma". By the classes definition, it means: "an inability to perceive something that is right in front of you". There have been various exercises done during class to prove this. This information however has not been suprising to me. I guess its just logical thinking that people all have different backgrounds and experiences that contribute into creating their own bias' based on those experiences. This is a good thing. Because of these differences, we are able to learn and grow from one another, it makes the world go around so to speak. However, these differences can also be a bad thing. When someone is different from you, it does not mean one person is better than the other. As an example(also something I can get quite upset over): During Utahs last elections there was a bill for an amendment(?, I'm not completley sure if it was a new law or an admendment to an old one) to make marriage only between a man and a woman. This was aimed directly at homosexuals and lesbians. My problem with this, has been Laws are for the purpose of protecting individuals rights, not prohibiting or excluding the rights of others. I believe its hippocritical of LDS members to push for such a law when, clearly, they're taught they need to be accepting of others, and of other beliefs. As another example, Wingers up in North Ogden wanted to sell alcohol last year some time too... and alot of people in the community were up in arms about it. My thoughts, just because they sell it does not mean you have to buy it. Live in the world but not of it so to speak. And if thats not enough for you... no one is making you dine at Wingers anyway...
Anyway, these are my thoughts, protected by the first admendment in the Bill of Rights. Which are Rights granted to all people regardless of race, religion or gender. Don't give them up lightly...
I wrote before that I wanted to buy a VW GTi.... Then my thoughts have changed slightly because of the future additions to the family, a two door may not be so practical. So, I've been thinking and when the time comes, I'll probably get a Subaru WRX (possibly the STi) OR an Evo... depends on price mostly... the Sub WRX is the cheapest of them, however, I'd most definately prefer the STi or Evo. What I'm saying is, I WANT A TURBO! :) I know this will probably make my brother jealous... especially if I get it while hes out on a mission... however, he'll just have to live with it. If everything was equal, I'd probably get the Evo over an STi, just because I love the look of the Evo. But I'm not *that* picky :) If I can get the STi for a decent price (when the time comes...) then I'll take it just the same. Anyway, thats how its going to be. Mostly my decision has been because I'm worried about the reliability of the VW's... I know they have quite the following, but I need something that people don't just say "Yup thats a VW for ya..." type of thing...
Which combined with knowing the definitions of intuition and empathy. The word just becomes that much cooler. I also realized that best describes how my learning exerpiences with respect to linux have been.
I bought the coolest DVD the other day Mischief Invasion. It has a stripped down, turbo charged M3 in it putting out like 450HP. It was wicked cool. Man I was drooling as I watched in amazement. Currently I'm ripping it to my hard drive so I can grab some of the best parts out of it. Just makes me want to get some more DVD's in this series(I have another one in the series, however its not even close to being as cool as this.) Every one in the movie is just crazy. Sadly they didn't get to run the M3 in the Cannon Ball Europe trip(it was stuck in customs), so they're causing havoc in a rental car which they eventually manage to sieze the engine after they hit a road cone going 100+mph. And they still manage to have more fun playing bumper cars in a round-about in France somewhere. Man...
I'm not sure what to say at the moment... last couple days i've been all sorts of weird moods and, in fear of saying something I shouldn't, I haven't written anything. So, in order to leave things that should not be said to, well not be said. I'm going to end this here.
Random Quote:
The thing to remember about freedom is that it's not given, it's taken.
