Taking awhile to get all the pictures back and digitized, plus set up in my silly self-written PHP-based web gallery software but the honeymoon photos are available for viewing. We were on the lovely quiet island of Kauai in Hawaii. Some nice ones are the two of us at the luaua, Vivian at the luau, Vivian looking cute, and me in front of Waimea Canyon. Enjoy!
Bonus: A photo of me with my parents at Mother’s Day brunch.
Have GWB and his cronies gone too far, in a Nixonian sense? Will we see a repeat of the tearful walk out to a helicopter and hear “I am not a crook?” 30 years later? John Dean, a man who played a prominent role in that episode, asks if what now appear to be Bush’s explicit lies to Congress and the American public rise to the level of high crimes and are grounds for impeachment?
As the estimable Oliver Willis says, “I do not believe that the impeachment of a president is a frivolous thing to be thrown around lightly.” Though the Republicans surely didn’t hesitate to go after Clinton like a starving pit bull over whether William Jefferson told the truth vis a vis how far he went with Monica. So I’m thinking, turnabout is fair play, what’s good for the goose, and so on with other relevent cliches.
The Whiskey Bar Blog had a similar collection of Bush lies, with numerous calls for impeachment, about a week before the Dean essay appeared, though one might expect that between writing and production lead time Dean’s piece was already in the works at that time. Hari, over on the inevitable MeFi thread, raised a scary point: if the Bushinator is impeached, we get President Cheney. And if that stress is too much for his pacemaker-supported heart, next in line is Speak of the House Dennis Hastert. Oh, that makes me feel so much better!
Possibly my favorable reaction to Dean’s column is because I feel duped by Bush into supporting the war in Iraq. As regular readers here know, I surely don’t support any of his other significant activities or initiatives, but I felt that with all the <airquotes>evidence</airquotes> on Hussein that we needed to put up or shut up. Now I’m thinking, “That lying son of a bitch has to go.” Given that his own party controls both houses of Congress (thanks Arizona, thanks Colorado, to pick on two states that should know better than to send two Republicans to the Senate), I don’t see impeachment getting anywhere.
But this surely gives the Democrats an issue, if they have the balls to pick it up, that can make a big difference in next year’s elections. Howard Dean the other night on The Charlie Rose Show seemed willing to enunciate his differences Our Fearless LiarLeader so I’ll be looking to him first for a response. Keep your eyes open, make sure this doesn’t fall between the cracks.
Some famous, some infamous, all in the news for making poor choices:
Even though I purposely left (national) politics off the list here, and trust me I wanted to include them, people (and I include myself as a person) need to think twice and act once. Listen up!
After owning this brown beauty since 1982, I think the time has come to find a new good home for my 1979 Fender Telecaster. I just don’t take the time to play it and the money could be used for better things than sitting in a case in the closet. I have a Line6 Flextone 60 Digital Guitar Modeling System that matches well and provides an amazing range of sounds–the fancy name is appropriate, not pretentious–also available.
Details are on the For Sale page but in short the Telecaster is $950, the Flextone is $325, and if you aren’t local to me you pay shipping. The guitar comes with a very nice hardshell Choice Product Development Company velvet-lined custom case and a cheap metal guitar stand. The Line6 amp comes with a four button floor pedal.
For now, this site and Craig’s List (guitar, amp) are my only marketing efforts, though I might put an entry on eBay soon too.
Update, 6/6, noon: Sadly, even though I’ve had over three dozen people click through from the Craigslist ads, no one has yet made an offer or inquiry of any kind. Bill says this is sad, boohoo!
The Barenaked Ladies blogged the making of their upcoming album. I’m not that much of a fan but I appreciate the spreading meme. Lots of viewable and listenable media provided for fans.
Just pretend the last 40 years haven’t actually passed by and you’re right in time for cool comic movie Down with Love. The script is so filled with double entendres that it couldn’t have possibly been made in 1963 as it pretends except that in those years just before the Summer of Love perhaps real conversation was filled with them. Either way, makes for a whole lot of laughs.
Investigative reporter Ewan McGregor stars as the Manhattan bachelor who every gal will sleep with and Renee Zellweger as the out of nowhere writer preaching a beyond Helen Gurley Brown philosophy of “Down With Love” so women put aside (romantic) love in favor of empowerment. Her book becomes a bestseller and ruins McGregor’s fun, pushing him to turn his celebrated journalistic skills on her. If the overnight sensation can be conned into falling in love, she’ll be discredited and he’ll have all the female fun desired.
Director Peyton Reed really does recreate the early ’60s, visually, sonically, and stylistically, going so far to have a big “Filmed in Cinemascope” credit in the opening credits. The soundtrack adds a very hip, cool element with Sinatra and bossa nova tunes plus a video featuring the two stars singing and dancing next to the end credits. The clothes, especially the women’s fashions, are just over the top, as are the set decorations (such as the amazing temporary housing Zellweger is set up in on her arrival).
David Hyde Pierce and Sarah Paulson head up a strong supporting crew as the respective best friends/co-workers; they also, of course, fall in love. Pierce plays the role Tony Randall specialized in, back in the day, while Randall has a decent cameo as the owner of the publisher where Zellweger and Paulson work. Most of the supporting roles, in fact, are filled by people we know best from TV: Jeri Ryan from Star Trek: Voyager is the most visible of McGregor’s playfriends, Jude Ciccolella (24), and Saturday Night Live supplies Rachel Dratch as Paulson’s secretary, Chris Parnell as a TV host, and Laura Kightlinger as a receptionist.
The plot swerves and twists in the last 20 minutes, ending up where you expect but after taking you for a different ride. Zellweger, in fact, has a very impressive soliloquy that threw me and the bud for a loop, to which McGregor reacts in sheer shock.
Definitely recommended
If you’re going to waste my time sending porn spam, could you at least include some decent pictures of the advertised activities? Otherwise, it’s just a waste of your time and my time, and I care about my time. Thanks for listening.
I can’t believe this! Outlook (2000 SR-1) adds a so-called security feature that blocks email attachments with certain extensions (generally, extensions that indicate executables) and there just is no way around this blockage. I mean what the fuck? Are we all to be treated as children now because Microsoft doesn’t think we can make decisions on our own? A programmer friend sent me a little utility and we couldn’t understand what was happening, why I couldn’t get this copied off. Finally he had to re-send it as a Zip file, which just goes to show that this Microsoft decision adds security only on paper. Evangelize this, Scoble, and explain why of all the MS bloggers, none are on the Outlook/Office team.
Thomas Friedman, as usual IMO, gives real insight into “why everyone hates us” these days, us being Americans. Bottom line is that America is just too powerful and too hard to influence from the outside. At the end he asks readers to send him suggestions: To “manage this situation will be critical to managing America’s relations with the rest of the globe. Any ideas? Let’s hear ’em: thfrie@nytimes.com.
I suffer no shortage of opinions or self-esteem issues that prevent sharing them, so I wrote in:
“Stop the lying. Claiming things that just aren’t true in support of extremist positions which are carefully labeled (by the speaker and supporting ancillaries such as Heritage Foundation) as moderate just doesn’t help. I’m not claiming there are no instances where secrecy isn’t a better choice but out and out lies are just wrong.”
Short but to the point. I’m hoping he’ll not only quote me but throw in a link to the website because Google just isn’t sending the traffic lately.
Woohoo! America’s goin’ whoopass on every other country on the planet once again, and aren’t you proud? We’ve got more people locked up in jails and prisons than any other country on the face of the Earth. Over two million total, over 700 per 100,000 population, beating out number two Russia which only locks up 655 per 100k–take that you stupid ex-commies! This is one piece of wonderful news that the Bushinations can’t take credit for, since it’s local and state politicians who’ve thrown the doors wide open over the years with additions like the Three Strikes laws.
We’re number one! Hey! We’re number one! Hey! We’re number one! Hey!
Interesting article from the Toronto Sun (which apparently uses my old Netscape Application Server judging from the URL) on the state of the manned space effort in America. From a Canadian perspective, of course, with quotes from Canadians: science fiction writer Spider Robinson and astronaut Chris Hadfield. The latter hits the problem squarely on the nailhead:We want to go, in person, but why do it?
Thanks to Doc for the link love, always nice to be noticed by someone with such strong traffic patterns.
Based on a trusted friend’s recommendation, we saw The Italian Job today even though we thought the trailer showed so much plot it was spoiled. But…that’s true and still not true. I mean, the trailer shows a lot more of the plot than I think is a good idea but the acting and execution is so good that it’s worth $6.25 to see.
Mark Wahlberg is the lead in this film, though I’d have to say it’s more of an ensemble outing than a star turn. Charlize Theron, Edward Norton, Seth Green, Mos Def, and Jason Statham all have almost as big parts, it’s just that Wahlberg plays the leader of the gang is the focus of the decisions taken. As my friend who recommended this said, Charlize Theron is the most perfectly beautiful woman in the movies these days, an added bonus. Norton is of course not the most attractive male actor of his generation but even so he ought to work more closely with the makeup department when he uses facial hair; here his mustache and soul patch are just cheesy and diminish his performance which is not at all a dairy product.
Director F. Gary Gray is having a decent year; Italian Job is his second major release following Vin Diesel’s A Man Apart. He really does a nice job with the pacing here, tightening the action well but leaving room for humorous bits from Statham, Mos Def, and especially Green. Husband and wife writing team Wayne and Donna Powers took minimal help from the original 1969 version starring Michael Caine, creating memorable characters and set ups. The soundtrack has a terrific updated version of Pink Floyd’s Money, though I can’t find a listing to see who’s done the recording.
I’d compare this movie quite favorable to the two other major recent heist films, The Score, also starring Norton, and Heist. Both of those films (to be blunt) sucked, despite the superior casts, lacking a slightly important element called dramatic tension.
Recommended
Some very senior Dept. of Justice employees will be running for the hills, or at least for their lawyers, after a report on the legality of certain post-9/11 detentions is (finally!) released on Monday. Among those named, I was quite surprised to see Michael Chertoff, head of DOJ’s Criminal Division, who I mainly knew from his really top-notch job as US Attorney in New Jersey. For a Republican he seemed okay but apparantly he got caught up in the DC morass and went way past the bounds of decency.
In related news, the Bushites are pushing Colin Powell out front to defend their use of intelligence leading up to the Iraqi War as more and more of the games they played with the data come out. Powell, of course, is seen as the out of the inner circle moderate and I suppose Rove and Company hope to leverage his credibility to deflect what they can’t discredit.
A senior unnamed national security official told the Mercury News: “If many more months go by and our troops are still there, the Iraqis are still fighting each other and us, and we still haven’t found any WMD there will be hell to pay.” I see no reason that this won’t come to pass and perhaps end up as the key in leading the Democrats back to power, White House and Senate, in 2004. Assuming that they can find a candidate who is better than a bowl of lukewarm oatmeal to run for President–Dean may be able to pull this off but I don’t see Lieberman or Kerry making the cut.
“WASTE is a software product and protocol that enables secure distributed communication for small (on the order of 10-50 nodes) trusted groups of users.” That was the message posted on AOL subsidiary NullSoft website yesterday. Got a lot of favorable play.
But apparently pissed off someone higher up in the corporate foodchain, who had it pulled. “The quiet launch of Waste was the work of Nullsoft’s principal developer, Justin Frankel, a soft-spoken 20-something known for his tech savvy and his streak of rebelliousness.” Frankel pulled a similar stunt a couple of years ago which gave the world Gnutella and all it’s cousins, so the outcome this time ought to be interesting, at least.
WASTE download page as of Friday, 4:30 PST: “An unauthorized copy of Nullsoft’s copyrighted software was briefly posted on this website…The posting of the Software on this website was not authorized by Nullsoft….If you downloaded or otherwise obtained a copy of the Software, you acquired no lawful rights to the Software and must destroy any and all copies of the Software, including by deleting it from your computer.”
For now at least, WASTE can be downloaded from a Harvard webserver, though this archive seems to be the C language source files (with some docs and ancillary material) and not a compiled executable.
Watch out for your credit history, problem’s not just from identity thieves but from the companies that keep and rate your credit. Their mistakes can haunt you for years, costing you real money. Private business with big lobbying budgets and lots of friends are finding little difficulty operating in our modern milieu.
Bush Administration: Krugman chimes in with waggy dog stories, where he once again tries to play the little boy who refuses to delude himself into seeing the emporer’s clothes. Column draws the explicit parallels from the Bushinations to Wag the Dog.
FCC: Next week, despite protests from small towns to media entrepreneurs, the FCC will vote to remove many of the current restrictions, thin as they already are, on the five giants that control most all the American media outlets. Rep. W.J. “Billy” Tauzin, the chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, called loosening media ownership caps an important step toward bolstering freedom of speech. “It is now time for the commission to act,” the Louisiana Republican said. “In a highly competitive, diverse 21st century marketplace, the idea of the federal government trying to regulate media ownership should be as offensive to Americans as trying to regulate free speech itself.” Not surprisingly, the Heritage Foundation is glad to provide ideological cover for this action.
PATRIOT Act: There are aspects of this bill beyond what anyone was already worked up about and are only just now coming to light. The Feds are now able to seize disputed funds held by foreign banks because most of these banks have to have funds in America to facilitate their business; with a court order in hand, the funds–even though they have no direct connection to the monies being attacked other than being held by the same bank–are taken. And even though the PATRIOT Act was supposed to be about combating terrorism, this part has little or nothing to do with that threat. For instance, someone (an American in this case) scams money from Americans and flees to a banana republic where bribes and such can protect him from extradition. However, he does allegedly deposit money in a local bank which has funds in New York and–voila–the Feds can sieze it.
Two games down, two to go, and the greatest goaltender now playing, the Devils’ Martin Brodeur, hasn’t even been challenged in putting up two shutouts. JS Giguere came into the Finals as the man with the buzz but he’s given up five goals (the Devils’ last in Game One was to an empty net) and the New Jersey defense has been absolutely stifling. Props to former SJ Shark Jeff Friesen for getting his scoring touch going, particular the very sweet shot he made tonight.
BillSaysThis 
