My Thoughts on Changes

Just go and look at the picture of a bunch of guys, “relaxing” in hammocks, with laptops firing RF beams all around… And then they want to “erase” stereotypes? Guys, you are not helping!
CNN.com – Geeks gather at ‘What The Hack’ – Jul 29, 2005
Geeks gather at ‘What The Hack’
Computer security conference aims to erase stereotypes
Friday, July 29, 2005 Posted: 0605 GMT (1405 HKT)

LIEMPDE, Netherlands (AP) — There are hundreds of tents on the hot and soggy campground, but this isn’t your ordinary summertime outing, considering that it includes workshops with such titles as “Politics of Psychedelic Research” or “Fun and Mayhem with RFID.”

Where is Jerry Seinfeld when you need him?
CNN.com – Roberts documents reveal a conservative – Jul 27, 2005

Limiting Supreme Court’s reach
Roberts argued that Congress had the power to limit the Supreme Court’s appellate jurisdiction on controversial issues, like abortion, busing and school prayer — but advised that doing so would be “bad policy,” according to recently released memos.
A document dated April 12, 1982 shows that Roberts disagreed with the view of then-Assistant Attorney General Ted Olson that Republican legislation in Congress to limit such jurisdiction faced constitutional problems.
The Justice Department later sent a letter to the Senate and House Judiciary committees, concluding that Congress not curtail the high court’s jurisdiction, the documents show.
Three years later, in a memo to his boss in the White House counsel’s office, Fred Fielding, Roberts would still argue that the Senate bill to stop the Supreme Court from hearing challenges to voluntary school prayer laws was constitutional.
But he also advised that the Justice Department not reverse course and to “let sleeping dogs (an apt reference, given my view of the opinion) lie,” he wrote.

Mind you, I had to run for the nearest Merriam-Webster to find out what the heck “dragooned” means… I feel “harpooned” when I find a new word and the only way to take it out is to find their meaning. I should play more Scrabble…
La Vache Qui Lit

Perfectly clear words can be dragooned into sentences so grammatically torturous and incoherent that any meaning once inhabiting those words runs screaming fro
m the wreckage.

Then, if you go and read the article with the “Dianetics” critic you find this quoted words from the book:

Dianetics begins with a stern admonition: “Important Note: In reading this book, be very certain that you never go past a word you do not fully understand. The only reason a person gives up a study or becomes confused or unable to learn is because he or she has gone past a word that was not understood.”

Wise words if I’ve ever read any… Talk about pointing to the obvious. Hey, Tom Cruise, “you had me at hello”…

There is a reason circus monkeys are trained: so they would not bite their masters. In this context, the masters are the “people” who pay their taxes so that the monkeys can receive their pay. You can train a monkey to do a number of things, but, would you trust a monkey with a loaded .357? Well, at least not overnight in a place where  carrying firearms is a completely alien concept in the popular psychology (and this includes that of the monkeys) You cannot reverse a policy of “no” weapons carrying for a police force on a flick of a switch and expect they will not get trigger-happy with their new found toys… I’m afraid this is just the beginning of “a series of unfortunate events…”

Relatives and Friends Remember a Busy, Hopeful Man, and Discover a New Fear – New York Times

But on Friday morning, Jean Charles de Menezes became another innocent casualty of London’s terrorist wars, shot and killed on the London Underground by police officers who mistook him for a would-be suicide bomber. The police have expressed regret for what they called a tragedy, but the incident brought fresh horror to Londoners who look at Mr. Menezes and see their sons, their brothers or themselves.”Now I think it could happen to me, to anyone, to someone who was just visiting,” said Mr. Menezes’s cousin Alex Alves Pereira, a student in London who has emerged as a spokesman for the shocked family. “We are not safe here.

PS: Sorry to confess that I strongly believe that emotional IQ goes out the window with every minute of tactical training a police officer or a military personnel takes. It is a recipe for the the concoction of state sponsored sociopaths. Sure, it is always easier to react than to fix the root problems of many issues, but, does that makes us any better human beings?

PPS: Sorry too if anybody feels offended by the comparison. Violence, be it religiously motivated or state sponsored, is violence and goes beyond any logical excuse or reasoning. When all of them come back to the fold of “human beings” then there will be no need for comparisons. Mind you, I am well aware that a lot of “civilians” are salivating at the opportunity to crack some heads in the name of patriotism. Actually, “Planet of the Apes” is a great metaphor for what I’m saying. Just watch the movie…

Great!! The new version of Windows will be called “Vista,” Spanish for “View” or “Sight,” depending on the context where it is used.
I guess is something else to blame Hispanics for when things start going wrong, right from the start, with the new version of Windows… (insert big tongue in cheek picture here)
Microsoft christens its latest baby – ZDNet UK News

The next version of Windows, until now referred to by its code name Longhorn, finally has an official name: Windows Vista.
The advertising tagline for Vista is “Clear, Confident, Connected: Bringing clarity to your world,” according to a video of the announcement posted by Microsoft.

Good God! Thanks! Coming from him…. I feel so much better now… (although, for some reason, that “probably” word is kind of stuck in my throat) Does that means that Lieberman and the so called “moderates” (what the heck is a “moderate”? A timid “liberal”? Perhaps
a circumstantial “conservative”? What is it?) would “probably” approve him in the hearings or “probably not”? Why do they always leave me with more questions?
Lieberman: Roberts Probably Not Extremist

A moderate Democratic senator who helped broker a deal over President Bush’s judicial nominations said Thursday that Supreme Court nominee John Roberts doesn’t seem to be the kind of right-wing candidate they feared the president would select.

This reminds me of a little trivia I read almost twenty years ago; it had to do with China and its people. One of the factoids was that if the Chinese paraded on a street, four in a row, they would parade for eternity. Another factoid was that if all the Chinese people jumped at exactly the same time they would knock Earth out of its orbit. Talk about “low tech” warfare…
China’s stealth war on the U.S.

Their different approaches include financial warfare (subverting banking systems and stock markets), drug warfare (attacking the fabric of society by flooding it with illicit drugs), psychological and media warfare (manipulating perceptions to break down enemy will), international law warfare (blocking enemy actions using multinational organizations), resource warfare (seizing control of vital natural resources), even ecological warfare (creating man-made earthquakes or other natural disasters).

Perhaps the day the people of this country overcomes their apathy towards anything political. Not until then and perhaps “then” would be too late to really change anything…
The man who could shift the court right | csmonitor.com

The formal announcement has triggered a massive campaign by both conservative and liberal advocacy groups seeking to mold public opinion either for or against Judge Roberts. And it sets the stage for a Senate showdown that could, once again, test the limits of political resolve in Washington.

No pun intended (but mark my words, just in case….) Just a reflection on the speed our president can make a decision when just hours before he was playing poker with the reporters…

Bush Drops Supreme Bomb On Rovegate

Prime time is a special time in America, a time when families gather ’round the warm glow of the 42-inch screen to watch sitcoms, cop shows, and the occasional presidential address about bombing some country. But Tuesday will be different as President Bush goes before the cameras at 9 p.m. to announce the winner of the 2005 Supreme Court Sweepstakes.

Wow, that was fast: Just yesterday the president was asked about his pick at a White House press conference with the prime minister of India.

People who think the president might cast his deputy chief of staff to the wolves need to get another fantasy. Short of a Nixonian resignation by George W. Bush, or an indictment and conviction, the Architect, Bush’s Brain, Turd Blossom, or by whatever name he is called, Karl Rove is on for the long ride. There would be no Bush presidency without Rove. All hopes of Republican realignment would be cast aside without Rove. Any aspirations George W. Bush had for a legacy beyond a hopeless war would be disappear as quickly as evidence of a Rove dirty political attack.