Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Why I moved from OH Part Duex...

Doing my taxes for this year... Did the calculations for my NC W2 first... And HEY!!! THE FED OWES ME OVER $900!!! P-A-R-T-Y T-I-M-E WOOOO HOOO!!!

Then I add in my last W2 from MIS... So far I owe the fed $132 :(

NOOOOOO!!!!! KKKKKKAAAAAAAAAHHHHHNNNNNN!!!!

KKKKKKAAAAAAHHHHHHNNNNNNNN!!!!!!!

Saturday, February 24, 2007

Chimps make spears...

From the Washington post... I thought this was interesting, Chimps making spears and hunting!

Link

Monday, February 19, 2007

New JFK footage released...

Well, was just reading my yahoo RSS feeds, and found out that apparently there was a new JKF film released, shot just moments before the president lost his life. I just downloaded it, and I can tell you right now that it is extremely high quality. However it seems that the person who shot the film didn't capture the shooting (or at least it's not on the video released to the Internet), so it appears there is no new evidence as to what happened.

Not that I'm a conspiracy theorist, but hey.... Considering the fact that the official investigation is so controversial, it would have been nice if there was something to either definitively prove or disprove it (not that it would quite the radicals). But it is one awesome video of the first couple. If you want to check it out, go to www.jfk.org, expect less that great response times on the video. And in fact you might want to right click and save as rather than just click and open.

Monday, February 12, 2007

Proof of god...

Well ok, perhaps not scientifically undeniable... But then again I suppose the idea of trying to scientifically prove god exists would be rather silly anyway. But I came across this heart warming rather cool story on CNN tonight, and I thought I would share.

'Miracle' -- teen's heart, stopped for 4 days, beats again

NEW YORK (AP) -- Daniel Walker was on his final lap jogging in his high school gym class when he collapsed, his flawed heart giving out on him.

More than four days later, his heart at a standstill, kept alive by a bypass machine, it began beating again. The 17-year-old's parents called it divine intervention. His physicians were no less amazed.

"I've been a surgeon for 10 years, and this is probably one of the most incredible things I've ever seen," said Dr. Abeel Mangi, one of Walker's cardiac surgeons at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Columbia.

Between North Korean Nuke talks breaking down, Iran being belligerent about wanting a nuke program at all, the mess in Iraq and the persistent Taliban in Afghanistan it's rather nice to read something this positive in the news for a change!

Link to CNN.com story

Sunday, February 11, 2007

I haven't posted much political stuff, but...

Pentagon report says ex-policy chief gave questionable info to White House..

WASHINGTON - Intelligence provided by former undersecretary of defense Douglas J. Feith to buttress the White House case for invading Iraq included "reporting of dubious quality or reliability" that supported the political views of senior administration officials rather than the conclusions of the intelligence community, according to a report by the Pentagon's inspector general.

Feith's office "was predisposed to finding a significant relationship between Iraq and al Qaeda," according to portions of the report, released yesterday by Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.). The inspector general described Feith's activities as "an alternative intelligence assessment process."

 

Well, just before the invasion of Iraq in '02 I was considering joining the Army, but decided not to because I believed at the time (indeed since Sept. 11th) that we would be invading Iraq and that it would be a mistake. It's not that I was unwilling to die for my country, more that I didn't want to risk it for such a frivolous cause.

Well, after reading about the results of the Pentagon's internal investigation of the actions taken by one of their former leader I have to say I'm glad I didn't. It really seemed to me back then that there was nothing Sadamm could have done to avert war.

I'm not really sure what drove him (heck, I just know what is printed in the papers). Did he just fall in love with the idea of being a war time president? Did he truly believe everything he was saying? Or did he just make him self believe it because of "victory disease" as the Japanese would come to call it after WWII?

Whatever the reason, we're in Iraq now, and it seems to be stuck there. Unlike what many in the newly elected Democratic majority seem to think, it's my belief that at this point we can't just leave. There can't be a phased redeployment starting immediately, no troop with drawls.

Lets face it, we blew them to kingdom come, and now they are left with a weak government that is in capable of defending it's self against Al-Quida insurgents and sectarian militants. If this "unity" government in Iraq were to fail, I have no doubt that no matter who stepped in we, and the entier middle east community would be significantly worse off.

Oh well, perhaps next time we find our selves in a highly charged political environment calling for war against some tiny nation for whatever dubious reason the leaders of the day will look back on Iraq, then on Vietnam, and think better of it.

Link to full MSNBC news item

Friday, February 09, 2007

Wow... On of the coolest things I've read in a while

I get the follow in my nightly /. (slashdot for those that don't understand) email. Very exciting stuff out there, who know's what it could lead to!

[0]noahisaac writes "My brother just sent me an article he posted for the Rett Syndrome Research Foundation about a [1]cure for Rett Syndrome, a form of autism. According to the article, researchers successfully re-introduced a fully functional version of the MECP2 gene into mice that had been born with damaged MECP2 genes. Contrary to their expectations, the mice improved. In the article's words, 'restoration of fully functional MECP2 over a four week period eradicated tremors and normalized breathing, mobility and gait in mice that had previously been fully symptomatic and, in some cases, only days away from death.' The ramifications for people suffering from Rett Syndrome are obvious, but mutations of the MECP2 gene are also believed to be the cause of 'classic' autism, and a number of other neurological disorders."

Saturday, February 03, 2007

Homelessness...

I was looking at the Yahoo News RSS Feeds and I just happened to notice an article about a controversial law dealing with homeless people in Orlando FL. Apparently it deals with prohibiting people from feeding large groups of people in the parks. I'll leave it up to you to decide whether you think this is wrong or not, personally I'm all for feeding homeless people, but can understand the desire to not have this happen in parks where people want to relax. However, in the top of the article I found the following

"It's now illegal to feed the homeless in Orlando, Florida," Jay Leno, host of NBC's "Tonight Show," told a studio audience last summer in Burbank, Calif., during his opening monologue. "Have you seen the fat people walking around Disney World? We should make it illegal to feed THEM."

But when the Orlando Sentinel posted Leno's wisecrack on its Web site, local bloggers weren't laughing.

"Feeding the homeless only encourages more homelessness," one resident, with the moniker "Justin Credible," wrote. He then summed up his argument in an equation. "Less Homeless Less Problems Better Place to Live."

Feeding homeless people some how encourages people to live on the streets? Seriously, how? "Gee, if I just live on the streets and deal with whatever mother nature throws my way I'll get free food, awesome!" Dude, come on... No one really *wants* to be homeless, and I seriously doubt that free food every now and again isn't going to be sweetening the deal a whole bunch.

I guess from where I sit, it seems to me that perhaps a better thing for Orlando to do would be to first increase it's capacity to shelter and care for homeless people, then perhaps try and develop programs to get people to be self sufficient again. I know it's quite easy for me to be saying this sitting here in my apartment in NC, but it really does seem to me that very few programs that exist to help the destitute are really designed to help them take care of them selves, more just to ease the suffering a little bit for a short period of time. I don't know, I suppose those are just my thoughts. Have a fine day everyone :)

Friday, February 02, 2007

Windows Live Writer

Well then, I just downloaded a new Utility called "Windows Live Writer" which is designed around the idea of giving you a Windows program that lets you edit any kind of blog in WYSIWYG environment.

I guess, write off I would say it's interesting, and if it works pretty darn cool (not sure if it will post to blogger yet). Just imagin, you want to post something quick and not having to wait around for a webpage to load up.

Well, I suppose I"m going to try out posting this and seeing what happens. Wish me luck ;)

Edit: Well holy smokes it did!!!! I can't beleive it, how cool is  that. Here's the link if anyone else want's to give it a whirl:

Windows live writer