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For those who are skeptical of the whole EU project, as I am, it's probably good news that the "non" vote seems to be leading. But the "bloggeurs'" chief objection to the EU seems to be that it will disrupt France's decline into self-satisfied irrelevance by promoting Anglo-Saxon free market economics. Would that it were true!I think there's little risk of that, unfortunately.
From the AP via Fox News:
A Georgia bride-to-be who vanished just days before her wedding turned up in New Mexico and fabricated a tale of abduction before admitting Saturday that she had gotten cold feet and "needed some time alone," police said.I wouldn't exactly call it a happy ending, but it's certainly a much better outcome than I expected to see from this story.
Good news for fans of Rush (the band, not the radio host) from Power Windows, complete with a shout-out to Rip Rowan's article at ProRec on why the first release of Vapor Trails sounded so lousy:
Although still listed with no release date on most online resalers, the Vapor Trails Remaster is now included on Atlantic's Rush page, and according to a source close to Anthem Records, its release is imminent. This is good news for audiophiles who have long requested this remaster, for reasons aptly stated in this article written shortly after its original release.This is a good opportunity to point out that if Rush releases another studio album, hiring Rip to engineer it would be a good move.
I'm sure after I read the transcript of yesterday's press conference in detail there will be any number of reasons for me to rant about Bush and everything he stands for... but one detail sang out to me:
I believe a reform system should protect those who depend on Social Security the most. So I propose a Social Security system in the future where benefits for low-income workers will grow faster than benefits for people who are better off.
I don't know what Bush was smoking when he decided to say this, but he needs to buy it in bulk. What's fantastic about this is it is, on the surface, a thumb in the eye of the rich... except really it's not. If someone pulling down $250K a year gets a slightly smaller Social Security check when she's 72, she's probably not even going to notice.
I've said before that I don't have a particular problem with private accounts... but that they do nothing -- perhaps less than nothing -- towards stabilizing Social Security. This scheme, on the other hand, could make significant headway.
Kudos, Mr. President.
Forgive me if I'm repeating myself... because I feel like I've made this point before... but it's just too perfect an opportunity to pass up if I haven't.
My answer to the question "What would you talk to President Bush about if you had fifteen minutes of his time" would, quite literally, be a discussion of the pronunciation of the word "nuclear". Not because I want to correct him. (Okay, not just for that reason.) I really want to know which of the following is true:
(1) He really didn't know he was saying it wrong, and his advisors never bothered to correct him.
(2) Someone has corrected him and his response was either "you're wrong" or "I don't care".
(3) His advisors noted that he said the word wrong and either he or they decided he should continue, for added folksy charm.
It sounds ridiculous, but with the answer to this question I could find out something very important about W and his administration. Is he
(1) far too insulated and out of touch with reality,
(2) stubborn in the face of contradiction, or
(3) cynically pandering to the lowest common denominator of American ignorance.
Thereby I will know whether I should
(1) pity him,
(2) laugh at him, or
(3) fear him.
Michael Silence at the KnoxNews.com blog site notes:
Gallup polled Americans on what they'd talk to President Bush about if they had 15 minutes with him.As I said over there, I'm not sure what we can conclude from this. I back the President position on many moral issues and on judges, and in general approve of both the level and direction of his involvement in both. Neither would make my list of what to discuss with him, though. What is there to say? "Nice job, I agree with you?"
Scroll way down the page and you'll find moral issues just got a response of 6 percent, and just 1 percent mentioned the courts and judicial system.
The war in Iraq, the economy and Social Security topped the list.
Hey, super-cool. I was going to mention a rumor Engadget posted a couple of days ago about IBM finally releasing a Tablet PC, and before I could get to it, the rumor has evidently been confirmed via the FCC web site, according to IDG. If IBM had cooked this thing up a year ago, I'd probably own one by now, given my... professional ties to Big Blue. I still love my Toshiba M200 based on its design and features, but I've experienced some quality issues, including a prematurely flaky hard drive and a failed cooling fan. The Thinkpad T41 I use for work is bulletproof. Well, you know, I mean that figuratively; it's not actually bulletproof. At least, I don't think it is. It's never been shot at, that I recall. But I do know it's pretty tough, and has been very dependable since I got it.
Looks like the tablet is based on IBM's ultra-svelte X-Series Thinkpad:
The X41 Tablet Series comes equipped with wireless networking capabilities, supporting IEEE 802.11a/b/g wireless LAN standards and Bluetooth, according to the documents. Information about the processor that the X41 Tablet Series is based on, the amount of memory it comes with, its weight and dimensions, and when it will be made available was not disclosed in the documents.The Engadget post suggested a May 15 release date.
However, the pictures of the X41 Tablet Series appear to show a similar size screen to that of the currently available ThinkPad X41, which has a 12.1-inch TFT-LCD screen. Priced at $2199, the X41 also has a 1.5-GHz Pentium M processor, a 60GB hard drive, and 512MB of RAM, according to IBM's Web site.
This was originally going to be a post about how annoyed I am with the Social Security debate. That will have to wait, I'm afraid.
I went to that bastion of pinko-commie liberalism, cnn.com, and did a search for stories about "social security".
Sorted by relevance, the first to come up was "Two Guilty over Jakarta sex trade". The second was "Man tells police dead mother kept in freezer for years".
If this is what social security is doing, not only to us, but to those unsuspecting Indonesians, it clearly does need an overhaul!
A Nobel Prize-winning economist on Tuesday offered a theory for why more Americans apparently choose to stay fat: they are counting on medical progress to cure any ailments the extra weight might cause.Uh... okay. I have a theory, too. I think more Americans choose to stay fat because fattening foods are cheap and taste good and make you fat, whereas dieting and exercise, which make you thin, are hard work.
I just saw a Starbuck's customer order a "quad venti eight-pump caramel latté". If I'm not mistaken, that's four shots of espresso and eight hits of caramel syrup in 20 ounces of steamed milk. That's quite a drink. I'm pretty sure that much syrup would induce a sugar coma if the aneurism from the caffeine didn't kill you first.
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