Do you remember about … 6 months ago? All the Republicans talked about was having “straight up or down votes” in the senate. Now baby Republican Bitch Mitch McConnel and his minority cronies have voted to cut off debate on the Iraq War Resolution. Welcome to the world of hating up or down votes.
Today is Microsoft’s “big day.” After over 5 years they are releasing their new desktop operating system. Vista is much more of an evolutionary than revolutionary upgrade. I have been using the Business Edition of Vista since mid November, and aside from the Aero eycandy interface change and relocation of many settings I don’t really see too much that is new. In the meantime the Linux folk have continued to improve the eye candy offerings on that platform as well. This morning I installed Beryl on my Ubuntu desktop and it looks pretty good. I used compiz / xgl a while ago and it was pretty but buggy. Beryl, which is a fork of the compiz project, seems to be a much more tight and slick project.
Who wins this eyecandy war. I would have to give to the Beryl folk, as it seems like a much more natural fit. One should note that OS X has had fun visual effects for years.
I really love a friendly dress code. For seven days I had a not so friendly dress code, but that came to pass. Don’t we all do a better job when we are comfortable?
Let me start off by saying that I kind of like Mitt Romney. I think he is an ok leader who has skills that could make him an effective president. If you have been following Mitt’s quest to be president you will note that there are an awful lot political positions that he is changing in an attempt to woo Republican voters. A recent story in the Boston Globe highlighted Romney’s change on the gun control issue. MITT: Don’t let the republicans take your North Eastern progressive values away from you. A truly moderate Republican would be a very good thing to have in the 2008 election. Unfortunately Mitt and McCain seem to be swinging to the right.
I guess I’ll have to support Obama!
I just looked at my calendar and it looks as if I have a semi-busy week ahead. I ended last week in a productive way. I cleaned up my desk at home and at work which rarely, if ever, happens. While this is a relatively small action it tends to go a long way for me. When the little things are clean the larger things just work better. I hope for a good week! What a boring post.
Oh yes it is sweet and awesome to see democracy in action. I really am happy to see the Democrats back in power. Lets keep our eye on Pelosi and company to make sure that they put America back on track!
Today we hit 3000 military deaths in Iraq. Can someone tell me why they died?
While I am not going to give him any kudos for saying this, the last person in America to thing that the war was going well changed his mind. George W. Bush said yesterday in an interview with the Washington post that we are not winning in Iraq.
Well good damn times, we are all the person of the year. But the title may be a little mis-leading. Time magazine is not referring to everyone, but particularly the folks who participate in “Web 2.0.” I find the person of the year selection interesting and troubling at the same time. I remember several years ago when time named Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos as the person of the year, based almost entirely on the hype of the dot com bubble.  The Bezos person of the year designation came without Amazon making any profit. This years announcement comes when we should all ask the question what does Web 2.0 really mean. Does it mean that we, the people of the information age, have a real voice in spreading information, opinion, and community? Or does it mean that the new distribution of information that Web 2.0 provides will be just another avenue that the professional media will exploit as a means of delivery? We all love YouTube, but I have heard that some of the most popular videos are the professional videos that come out of the mainstream media.
Nevertheless, this is an exciting person of the year, even though it comes from the old media. Hell, even Matt Drudge had this as the top headline on his site. I guess we are all flattered.
I am watching Meet the Press. Brooks and Friedman are talking about Iraq. The situation has become so chaotic. Many of us are waiting for the President– The Decider — to change his policy. I think we have reached a point where there are no good decisions in Iraq. We have past the point of no return. We, the United States of America, have failed in Iraq. We lost. It sucks but it is true. We were in over our heads. The policy was flawed. The Middle East is just to much of a tinderbox for we naive Americans who thought we could bring peace and Democracy to the world. I think that this war may signal the decline of the America as the last remaining super power. We simply do not have the goodwill left to be the diplomatic leader of the world. What a shame.