• Mac1080HD - home of the HD converter for Mac
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  (tags: camcorder converter video osx hd avchd mac voltaic)

Maybe I’m a bit of an idealist, but I don’t like what Fox News did with Ron Paul, and accordingly they should never be allowed to host anything related to the elections ever again.

And that goes for all networks.

When you agree to do something for the greater good of the country like host a debate (despite my temptation to, I won’t be putting “debate” in quotes) or a “forum”, you’re obligated to provide equal time to all the candidates. Are you legally obligated? Of course not, but you are, at minimum, ethically obligated to give all candidates an equal share. By excluding Ron Paul, Fox News has basically sealed the fate of his campaign and probably ended it. Fox’s excuse doesn’t hold water and it doesn’t even come close to passing the sniff test. They dropped him because he was polling low and because they didn’t have the space (as you know, Rupert Murdoch doesn’t have the money for a bigger debate facility).

The New Hampshire GOP rightly pulled out of its sponsorship of the event, citing the importance of the New Hampshire Primary to a candidate establishing themselves.

“Only in New Hampshire do lesser known, lesser funded underdogs have a fighting chance to establish themselves as national figures,” Cullen said. “Consistent with that tradition, we believe all recognized major candidates should have an equal opportunity to participate in pre-primary debates and forums.”

David Rhodes, Fox’s vice president of news, did not address Cullen’s objection in a one-sentence statement released immediately after Cullen’s announcement.

“We look forward to presenting a substantive forum which will serve as the first program of its kind this election season,” Rhodes said.

Fox didn’t address the objection because they don’t have a leg to stand on. If you base participation on Iowa, Ron Paul did significantly better than Rudy Giuliani and yet you know he’ll be there. Funny how that works. Ron Paul, who did better in Iowa will not be there over the “favorite” that he beat who will.

When you host “forums” or debates, you have an obligation to allow candidates to participate. Ron Paul has been through the process and even a primary and deserves a right to be heard. That Fox News chose to exclude him from the debate smacks of partisanship and if the rest of the candidates had any balls (and they don’t, just listen to them), they’d pull out in solidarity. Instead they’ve decided to take advantage of a Paul-less “forum” and just move on in whoring themselves for votes.

It’s disappointing, and Fox should be punished.

End of story.

Oh yeah, they were pissed. In 2004, Mayor Bloomberg closed down a bunch of firehouses that would supposedly cripple poor neighborhoods and leave the streets loaded with piles of charred black people due to the callousness of the evil white Mayor. We heard how the plan was racist and bigoted, and how it was an affront to the poor people of color in New York City.

Except it didn’t happen and over the last two years, times have gone down although, the UFA in its typical posturing fashion points out that structural fire response times have gone up by 14 seconds. I understand the whole “every second counts” thing, but quibbling over 14 seconds sounds a lot like nitpicking to me.

Metro also notes that fire-related deaths are down dramatically…

A total of 96 civilian fire fatalities were recorded last year, the same figure recorded in 1927. Despite a Bronx blaze last March that killed 10 people, including nine children, there have been fewer civilian fire fatalities between 2002 and 2007 than in any other consecutive six-year period in recorded history.

Gothamist, for whatever reason didn’t comment on the story at all, going 100% factual instead, but I’ll say this. There are a lot of people in this city who owe Mayor Bloomberg an apology. The amount of FUD being popped around this city by the UFA, the Al Sharptons of the City and the other usual suspects has not matched the reality of what has happened in the city. As is usually the case, Bloomberg is right. He cut back where cuts could be made and no one was hurt for it except for the UFA who relies on keeping the firefighter rolls full of dues-paying members and for City Council members worried about re-election.

Now this is interesting… Oprah hasn’t started the trend everyone thought she was going to when she started nursing at the teet of everyone’s favorite clean and articulate black man…

Her two most favorite authors, Maya Angelou and Toni Morrison, have not opened their pocketbooks yet for Obama. (Angelou has traditionally been a Clinton supporter.)

Neither has Spike Lee nor Denzel Washington, although the latter’s wife Pauletta sent Obama $2,300. Motown founder Berry Gordy, Jr. has put his bucks in Hillary Clinton’s campaign, as has Quincy Jones.

Also missing from Obama’s list of donors in the current election cycle is BET Chairman and Founder billionaire Robert L. Johnson. The regular Democratic donor did give Hillary Clinton $4,600 in 2007. The last time he sent a check to Obama was in 2006, for $2,100.

Obama’s celeb donors include the recently controversial Will Smith, but not Chris Gardner, the multi millionaire whom Smith played in “The Pursuit of Happyness.” Obama did receive donations from the newly married Eddie Murphy and the always funny Chris Rock.

But neither Sean “Diddy” Combs nor Shawn “Jay Z” Carter has pitched in for the Illinois senator as of yet. Jay Z’s fiancée Beyonce Knowles has also remained silent. Her father, Mathew, last sent Obama $1,000 for his senate campaign.

Winfrey, meanwhile, may like Obama but hasn’t put the weight of her fortune behind him yet.

Oprah and boyfriend Stedman Graham, according to federal campaign records, donated only $2,300 each to Obama’s campaign at the party held at Winfrey’s Montecito, California mansion last September. They could have donated twice that amount.

[...]

Even now, her endorsement of Obama hasn’t led to any contribution to the Democratic Party in any form. Maybe she’s waiting to see if Obama is the official candidate.

Either that or she doesn’t really believe in him at all and was just doing her job as a black entertainer to get the black man elected?

GASP…

How horrible that I suggest such a thing. Oprah’s motives are as pure as the driven snow, dammit.

• Edwards: “The Clinton campaign has no conscience”
  This from a guy who uses Katrina as a backdrop for every major campaign announcement.
  (tags: edwards hypocrite pot kettle)

Heh… If this doesn’t summarize the vapidity of those two gasbags, nothing does…

I’m sick of hearing the word “change.” Last night, during the Democratic debate in New Hampshire, we heard it 90 times. Change, change, change. Blah, blah, blah. It’s an utterly empty word. Meaningless. The worst of political rhetoric. The worst of political bullshit. Pure spin. Cynical marketing. Juvenile pandering. ‘I’m change.’ “No, I’m change.’ ‘Are not.’ ‘Am, too.’ Nya, nya, nya.

Oh, just shut up and do something. Or at least say something. And don’t say “hope,” either. Say something about the economy (note that on Facebook — which is overwhelmingly and disproportionately in Obama’s camp — the users wanted to hear a lot more about that). And health care. And education. And technology. And Iraq. And energy. And the environment. Or just tell us what change means.

God bless Charlie Gibson last night — the best moderator on any debate so far, I’d say — who pointed to the emptiness of change when Barack Obama and John Edwards bragged about doing in those evil lobbyists and stopping them from corrupting democracy by buying legislators meals. Charlie pointed out that the only change in the rule is that they can’t buy lawmakers meals while sitting down.

Utterly empty. My God it’s as if I cowrote this post with him. Jarvis goes on to say there’s plenty that actually does need to be changed, and it’s time to stop talking about the concept of change and instead start talking about what actual changes can be made to make life better for Americans.

Imagine that.

Jeff Jarvis is smarter than our Presidential candidates (of course, I already knew that, but still).

Here’s what I want to hear from the candidates:

1. Forgetting the problem of people being uninsured; what are you going to do to see to it that people who are insured get the health care they need?

2. What do you plan to do in Iraq, and how?

3. Aside from scaring the pants off of people and crippling the economy, what real world and popularly viable things are you going to implement to make sure that our environment is protected?

4. What are you going to do to make sure that Social Security is there for me when it comes time for me to retire?

5. What are you going to do to make sure that countries like China stop sending poisoned crap into our country and killing our people?

If anyone wants to talk about change and hope, here’s the way I think we can address both…

I would hope that the candidates would change from talking about meaningless generic concepts and substanceless garbage and hope that all of the candidates will start talking real policy.

The first candidate who does will get my vote.

Barack Obama’s big theme is “hope,” and he delivers it in pure populist form (ie: platitudes galore and substance-absent). Hillary Clinton, apparently, has had enough of the love affair with Barackapalooza and its message of hope and points out that it isn’t about “talking about hope,” it’s about delivering…

If Barack sounded presidential when he droned on in his campaign about nothing, Hillary sounded downright brilliant in that clip. I’m sure Drudge didn’t post it because he agreed, but it’s still a cut above the vapid emptiness of people like John Edwards and Barack Obama.

I’m not a violent person. I do a lot of tough talking, and I have a habit of utterly dismembering people when they piss me off (I have a history in this area that’s undeniable). In the last few days, however, I’ve arrived at the conclusion that popping Robert Scoble right across the bridge of his nose would do wonders for my sanity.

Now, I should preface this by saying I’m actually a fan of Robert’s. I do enjoy his videos and I’ve been introduced to some great Web 2.0 stuff because of him. He’s a very good canary in the mine of Web 2.0 and always has his ear on the railroad tracks ready to move on to the next great shiny thing. In other words, an alpha-geek. In the last week, however, he’s aggravated me to the point where I’ve dropped him from Twitter and Facebook and couldn’t care less what he has to say, at least for now and the foreseeable future.

Last week he did something so insanely stupid that I had to take a step back, soak it all in, and try to believe it all because I couldn’t believe he even did it. Without rehashing that which has been rehashed over and over again and again, Scoble used a script on his Facebook account to scrape the names, e-mail addresses, and birthdates of his 5,000 followers on Facebook. Buy itself, that wouldn’t raise any red flags, right? And if Facebook decided they were within their rights to ban him on the spot, who could argue with that either?

That’s not the way things work in the brave new Web 2.0 world, though. In this case, Robert used a script provided to him by a company called Plaxo.

Who is Plaxo?

If you don’t know who Plaxo is, you were probably asleep through the early part of the 2000’s. Plaxo finagled its way onto lots of systems with the promise of keeping your address book automatically in sync with people’s changes. If I was a Plaxo user and changed my e-mail info, your address book would update automatically. All this sounded good to a lot of people who installed the app, only to find out that the business plan also included Plaxo spreading virally by spamming the address book of people who had it installed. On top of that, people became concerned at the sheer volume of data that Plaxo had sitting in its databases, and the service utterly collapsed.

Recently, the company had an epiphany, and with the introduction of the Open Social initiative, a conglomerate of companies in the social networking space focused on data sharing and open borders digitally. Conspicuous by its absence from this coalition is Facebook. Plaxo, however, took that opportunity to introduce Plaxo Pulse, a product that promised to do what Plaxo did for address books in 2004 to social networks in 2008.

So what’s with the fisticuffs?

Basically, Robert keeps missing the point over and over again. There are a lot of people that are seriously pissed off at him right now, and justifiably so.

Here’s a quote from Judi Sohn that really summarizes the problem with what Scoble did beautifully.

Robert Scoble valued his relationship with Plaxo more than he valued his relationship with his “friends,” otherwise he would have posted to them what he was doing with an experimental, alpha-quality and untested script before he did it…or he wouldn’t have done it at all.

So why does Plaxo scare me?

Because it’s a matter of trust, and I don’t trust them. Fine, you say, don’t give them any data. Oh, but that’s the scary part…it’s not my choice.

Right this minute, Plaxo probably knows your email address, your phone number, and where you work. You may have never visited their site, but if you’re online and with their how many million members there’s a good chance that someone who has you in their address book with accurate data has shared that information with Plaxo.

This is what Robert doesn’t seem to understand, and this is why I feel the need to punch him in the face. In doing so, I would hope to be rattling his brain back into place so he understands just why what he did was wrong.

Robert has contended that people shouldn’t have a problem with him doing this because it’s the same as people taking the data and entering it into their Outlook address book or their G-Mail address book. He’s also repeatedly called the reaction excessive and even has one of the Plaxo guys sitting in his comments and telling everyone that Plaxo is a nice company now. Really. Finally, he had the audacity to claim that he’s not doing anything with the data, that it’s living in a private account, and that he never had any intention to use it. He even went as far as saying he did this to “prove a point,” presumably about how Facebook’s data isn’t portable.

Let’s address these issues.

Who has the right to my data?

This is one of the central questions in the debate, so let’s address it first. Robert claims that sliding my e-mail address into Plaxo’s network is no different than putting my e-mail into his mail client or G-Mail address book. As far as I’m concerned this is the most asinine thing he’s said during the whole debate.

While it’s true that I may or may not have a problem with my data being plugged into Google’s servers, it’s your mail client, and I’m willing to accept that my address may end up in a mail client with a company I don’t particularly care for (mind you, this is all theoretical; I love Google and use every one of their products daily) since you’re free to use the information I’m sharing with you to get in touch with me.

But to say that giving the data to Plaxo is the same thing is simply stupid. Plaxo has a history of abusing customer data. You can tell me how much they’ve changed and how they’ve learned their lesson, but in the end Plaxo is a scumbag company with a scumbag history that wouldn’t even be around had it not been for the data they mined 3-4 years ago from unsuspecting user accounts. Anyone who knows the name Plaxo (except for Scoble, apparently) isn’t comfortable with them holding any personal data of theirs which is why this whole thing got started to begin with.

Robert got in bed with slime and woke up looking slimy.

But is it really my data?

Absolutely it’s my data, and absolutely I have a right to say what’s done with it.

To a point.

But Robert, of course, takes that to a whole new level and in trying to defend himself makes the ridiculous assertion that we need “Friend DRM”…

What if I wrote down Judi’s email and then manually put it into my Outlook’s contact database. Wouldn’t that have been exactly the same thing that I tried to do with Plaxo’s script?

Second, if you add me as a friend I assume you want me to send you emails and interact with you. But, it’s clear that some of you didn’t really want me to do that when you added me as a friend. Maybe we need DRM for friends.

No, stupid, because doing that doesn’t involve Plaxo. I’m sure he sat there and made that stupid laugh he makes in all of his videos as he wrote that. “I got her!” he thought, completely missing the point. There comes a time when you’re so sucked into every shiny new gadget and service that you can no longer objectively comment on any of them. I think Robert has hit that point.

He also makes another strawman point:

So, to Judi, why is it OK for Facebook to import all my Gmail email addresses? Why aren’t you screaming bloody murder about THAT? After all, did anyone on Gmail approve me to import their email addresses to Facebook?

[snip]

Is Plaxo a social monster for trying to import? That’s for you to decide, but why weren’t you all up in arms when Facebook imported your data and your friends email addresses from Gmail?

Again, it’s not the same thing for two reasons. 1: You can choose not to do it, and 2: Facebook isn’t storing your imported data for people you don’t connect with on their service.

Punching Robert in the face.

So the other day, after watching him continuously miss the point like some kid with really thick glasses on a little league field misses a baseball, I got angry and posted on Twitter that Robert’s latest post on his blog made me want to punch him in the face. The web is nothing if not efficient…

You might be thinking that this was a bit of hyperbole on my part, and of course it was. I don’t think I would ever punch Robert in the face. I still like him even if he is completely clueless about what exactly was wrong with what he did here, but what made me want to punch him in the face is the fact that despite a large chunk of people telling him what he did was wrong, and how they didn’t like it, he insisted that everyone else was wrong and what he did was no big deal.

I’m not one to succumb to crowds and have a popular opinion just to avoid controversy. Any long-time reader on this blog knows I love shredding people. Yesterday, on SRD Radio, I absolutely demolished Michael Crook’s idiotic argument that soldiers are getting rich off their military salary and made him look completely stupid in the process (you can hear that here; it’s toward the middle of the show). I’m not one to back down just because my opinion isn’t popular or because it faces strong objections or reactions.

That being said, sometimes you do have to know when to apologize, suck it up, and shut up. I’ve done that too. Just because you think you’re right doesn’t mean you are, and in this case Robert thinking he’s right is utterly meaningless because most of the feedback he’s gotten that I’ve been able to see has been negative. Whether or not you think you’re wrong, that means you might want to apologize, particularly to people who you call “friends.” If friendship to you means that I give you my data and you can do what you want with it because we’re “friends,” then it works the other way too and when you hurt your friends or disappoint them, you also have an obligation to man up and apologize to them rather than making excuses. Even though you don’t think you did anything wrong, lots of people apparently do.

One last thought

Data portability isn’t really the issue here. Do I like that my data lives and dies with Facebook? Not particularly, no. That being said, I’m not losing any sleep over it either. This issue was never about data portability, though. It’s been about who Robert chose to share his “friends’” data with since the minute it came out that the reason Facebook canned him was for a script he was running that was authored by Plaxo. You can spin it anyway you want, and you can turn yourself into a martyr for data portability if that makes you feel better and, in your mind, justifies what you did, but we all know the truth.

You screwed up. You gave people’s data to a company they don’t like and or trust and a company that has a history of abusing customer data. For that, you owe the community, the people you call friends, an apology.

Stop justifying and rationalizing and start apologizing.

Photo courtesy of Will Pate via Flickr.

• Skype hack for Mac: restore Auto Gain Control and Echo Cancellation
  If you run Skype on a Mac, you simply have to do this because the folks that designed the gui for the Mac version are fucktards and didn’t make it as useful as the Windows version.
  (tags: apple cancellation hack lifehacks mac microphone skype software)

So my birthday is January 28th, and Circuit City sent me a nice $10 coupon for a purchase of $100 or more. I thought that was kinda cool because I do shop at Circuit City a lot (seeing as I hate Best Buy and there really are only two competing stores).

Anyway, upon further inspection of the coupon, I realize just how worthless it is…

Other than those restrictions, I can use it anywhere! Yay me!

Are they for real with this shit?

• Huckabee: ‘A new day in American politics’ - USATODAY.com
  (tags: iowa caucus results stats)

This week, we talk about the Facebook/Plaxo/Scoble debacle, politics in Iowa, and Robert Scoble again.

• Vinny highly recommends that you see Maria Full Of Grace.
• Did Robert Scoble get caught with his hand in the cookie jar, or was he an innocent bystander?
• DownloadSquad has the perfect quote to sum up what Facebook is all about.
• Zooomr users bolted to a Flickr group called “Zooomr Exodus”.
• We talk politics, the Iowa caucus, and the candidates for President.
• Scoble posted this just as we were finishing the show.
• Slobokan is craving Five Guys. So we’re outta here.

Our theme song:

• Termoli by Stargarden (courtesy of Magnatune)

Bandwidth provided by:

• Second Rate Hosting

Download the podcast: Information Salad - Episode #71

• Flash
• | QuickTime

Oh Jesus, will these people just go away?

I did this video last Friday but it still applies…

Let’s find out. Here’s a transcript of the Great Barack speaking truth to power last night after winning the Iowa Caucus (hey, did you know he’s black? I sure didn’t; it’s not like they were reminding us of that fact every ten seconds)…

You know, they said this day would never come. They said our sights were set too high. They said this country was too divided, too disillusioned to ever come together around a common purpose.

A common purpose? Hmmm… 3 candidates at the top separated by 10 percentage points total. Doesn’t exactly sound like a united front. Or, to put it differently, 16 delegates for Barack, 14 for Edwards, and 15 for Clinton. Oh yeah. There’s a mandate for ya. And just for the record, longshot Republican Mike Huckabee damn near doubled your vote numbers and delegates. Let’s not kid ourselves, sir.

Actual content rating: Zip.

But on this January night, at this defining moment in history, you have done what the cynics said we couldn’t do.

You have done what the state of New Hampshire can do in five days. You have done what America can do in this new year, 2008.

What? Have a close election? The delegate system is closer to the electoral college system, Senator.

Actual content rating: Zip.

In lines that stretched around schools and churches, in small towns and in big cities, you came together as Democrats, Republicans and independents, to stand up and say that we are one nation. We are one people. And our time for change has come.

You said the time has come to move beyond the bitterness and pettiness and anger that’s consumed Washington.

Our time for change has come? My friend, Republicans didn’t line up because it’s time for change. They lined up because it’s time to vote. Anyone who wins is going to be change. It’s the nature of our election system.

Actual content rating: Zip.

To end the political strategy that’s been all about division, and instead make it about addition. To build a coalition for change that stretches through red states and blue states.

Because that’s how we’ll win in November, and that’s how we’ll finally meet the challenges that we face as a nation.

We are choosing hope over fear. We’re choosing unity over division,

Drivel. Hope… Change… blah blah blah.

Actual content rating: Zip.

You said the time has come to tell the lobbyists who think their money and their influence speak louder than our voices that they don’t own this government - we do. And we are here to take it back.

Yep. With the help of PACs funded by lobbyists, which is how Mr. Obama makes most of his money. Oh, and don’t forget the special interests in Hollywood. I guess they do own the government.

Actual content rating: Zip. 1, if you count hypocrisy.

The time has come for a president who will be honest about the choices and the challenges we face, who will listen to you and learn from you, even when we disagree, who won’t just tell you what you want to hear, but what you need to know.

Blah blah blah blah blah. More talking, still no substance. It makes ya feel real good, though.

Actual content rating: Zip.

And in New Hampshire, if you give me the same chance that Iowa did tonight, I will be that president for America.

I’ll be a president who finally makes health care affordable and available to every single American, the same way I expanded health care in Illinois, by by bringing Democrats and Republicans together to get the job done. I’ll be a president who ends the tax breaks for companies that ship our jobs overseas and put a middle-class tax cut into the pockets of working Americans who deserve it.

I’ll be, I will, I can, I am. How? Well, no one knows. He just makes a bunch of promises. Hey, he’s gonna get Republicans and Democrats to work together, though. That’s kinda cool. It’ll be interesting to see how he makes that happen considering he’s spent his entire campaign calling Republicans divisive, fear mongering, and bickering. You go Mr. Uniter Man.

Actual content rating: Zip.

I’ll be a president who harnesses the ingenuity of farmers and scientists and entrepreneurs to free this nation from the tyranny of oil once and for all.

Oh yeah, right. Again, how will he do that? Nobody knows. He’s just gonna do it. And we need to trust him. Break out the harnesses, folks. Barackapalooza is in town.

Actual content rating: Zip.

And I’ll be a president who ends this war in Iraq and finally brings our troops home who restores our moral standing, who understands that 9/11 is not a way to scare up votes but a challenge that should unite America and the world against the common threats of the 21st century. Common threats of terrorism and nuclear weapons, climate change and poverty, genocide and disease.

Genocide in the US? Nope. Disease in the US? Maybe. Climate change? Yeah. Let’s see you get something done there. Nuclear weapons? I can feel the disarmament cries already. 9/11 isn’t a way to scare up votes? Maybe, but it sure seems like a good way for you to scare up opposition… How he’s going to do all this is unknown, but he’s never let that stop him before.

Actual content rating: Zip.

Tonight, we are one step closer to that vision of America because of what you did here in Iowa.

God help us.

And so I’d especially like to thank the organizers and the precinct captains, the volunteers and the staff who made this all possible.

And while I’m at it on thank yous, I think it makes sense for me to thank the love of my life, the rock of the Obama family, the closer on the campaign trail.

I know you didn’t do this for me. You did this because you believed so deeply in the most American of ideas - that in the face of impossible odds, people who love this country can change it.

Nah, they just bought into some slick feel-good speak from a black guy who sounds white. To paraphrase Joe Biden, people are amused at a black man who doesn’t talk ghetto.

I know this. I know this because while I may be standing here tonight, I’ll never forget that my journey began on the streets of Chicago doing what so many of you have done for this campaign and all the campaigns here in Iowa, organizing and working and fighting to make people’s lives just a little bit better.

I know how hard it is. It comes with little sleep, little pay and a lot of sacrifice. There are days of disappointment. But sometimes, just sometimes, there are nights like this, a night that, years from now, when we’ve made the changes we believe in, when more families can afford to see a doctor, when our children inherit a planet that’s a little cleaner and safer, when the world sees America differently, and America sees itself as a nation less divided and more united, you’ll be able to look back with pride and say that this was the moment when it all began.

Oh please. Spare me the “I grew up with a shitty name on shitty streets” speech. I can’t take much more of this from him and it’s only getting started.

This was the moment when the improbable beat what Washington always said was inevitable.

What the fuck are you blabbering about? Everyone but the dumbest of the dumb knows a Democrat is going to win the White House this year.

This was the moment when we tore down barriers that have divided us for too long; when we rallied people of all parties and ages to a common cause; when we finally gave Americans who have never participated in politics a reason to stand up and to do so.

Sure. The first clean articulate black guy. We get it.

This was the moment when we finally beat back the policies of fear and doubts and cynicism, the politics where we tear each other down instead of lifting this country up. This was the moment.

Beat back the policies of fear? Three paragraphs ago, we heard about nuclear war, terrorism, climate change, disease and poverty. Is that not fear?

Years from now, you’ll look back and you’ll say that this was the moment, this was the place where America remembered what it means to hope. For many months, we’ve been teased, even derided for talking about hope. But we always knew that hope is not blind optimism. It’s not ignoring the enormity of the tasks ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path.

Hope? Feh. Your hope involves telling people what they should think. You admitted it, yourself.

It’s not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it and to work for it and to fight for it.

Really? What have you fought for in Congress? I didn’t know your name at all until you ran for President. What leadership have you exhibited? Oh right. None. But hey, he talks real purdy.

Hope is what I saw in the eyes of the young woman in Cedar Rapids who works the night shift after a full day of college and still can’t afford health care for a sister who’s ill. A young woman who still believes that this country will give her the chance to live out her dreams.

Blah blah blah.

Hope is what I heard in the voice of the New Hampshire woman who told me that she hasn’t been able to breathe since her nephew left for Iraq. Who still goes to bed each night praying for his safe return.

Blah blah blah.

Hope is what led a band of colonists to rise up against an empire. What led the greatest of generations to free a continent and heal a nation. What led young women and young men to sit at lunch counters and brave fire hoses and march through Selma and Montgomery for freedom’s cause.

Blah blah blah.

Hope, hope is what led me here today. With a father from Kenya, a mother from Kansas and a story that could only happen in the United States of America.

Yep. You’re a role model, Barack. We get it.

Hope is the bedrock of this nation. The belief that our destiny will not be written for us, but by us, by all those men and women who are not content to settle for the world as it is, who have the courage to remake the world as it should be.

Hope is not the bedrock of this nation, sir. Hard work is. Sacrifice is. Only a Democrat could stand up during an election and spew forth the stupidity that “hope” defines this country. Is it “hope” that put you where you are? Or hard work? Think about it.

That is what we started here in Iowa and that is the message we can now carry to New Hampshire and beyond.

The same message we had when we were up and when we were down; the one that can save this country, brick by brick, block by block, that together, ordinary people can do extraordinary things.

Because we are not a collection of red states and blue states. We are the United States of America. And in this moment, in this election, we are ready to believe again.

Thank you, Iowa

Yeah, thanks Iowa. An emboldened Barack Obama is just what we need. Rhetoric, drivel, and “hope.” A whole lot of speaking, but not a lot said.

Welcome to Election 2008.

Transcript via Guardian Unlimited

• eirikso.com » Test clips from Panasonic HDC-SD5
  Finally! Someone actually posted some raw footage from the HDC-SD5. I’ve only been waiting for that since it came out.
  (tags: panasonic camera camcorder hd hdc-sd5 footage video)
• Celestron.com/Microscopes/LCD Digital Microscope (LDM)
  I want this thing so bad I can taste it. I’d whore myself for it.
  (tags: microscope gadget toy envy)

• CakePHP : The PHP Rapid Development Framework :: Home
  (tags: ajax application api php framework development programming cakephp apps blogging blog computer cool webdev web)

Oh how time flies. 6 years ago today Insignificant Thoughts was set up as a small personal site on Geocities. Things have been much better ever since and it’s gone from a static HTML site to a blog to a photoblog and back to a blog with audio, video, pictures, and all kinds of goodness.

It’s good to be doing it. I don’t necessarily keep it up as much as I’d like to, but I’m glad to have it around.

Thanks for sticking around to all of you, and here’s to another year of you guys reading / watching / listening to my drivel