The Blog with No Name

Looks like Sen. Stevens isn’t the only one who had a secret hold a bill to create a government database of spending. Sen. Byrd had a hold on it too. What was his reasoning?

Byrd merely wanted more time to evaluate the legislation that would create a new database of some $2.5 trillion in federal spending on contracts, loans, financial assistance and insurance.

“Senator Byrd wanted time to read the legislation, understand its implications, and see whether the proposal could be improved,” Gavin [Byrd's spokesman] said.

Ah yes, he needed more time to study a high profile bill that’s been working it’s way through the system since the middle of last month. Way to be on top of things, Senator.

He has since removed the hold.

(via Instapundit)

In light of Iran’s ignoring of UN pleas to stop uranium enrichment, this article seems especially timely. The author surveys some of the current right-wing and left-wing drawing of analogies between Iran and previous world conflicts, and concludes both are misguided in some way. His conclusion:

What these commentators are picking up is not an exact parallel to any one event of the 1930s—hence their scattershot of historical analogies. Instead, what they are picking up is a sense of the overall direction of world events: we are clearly headed toward a much larger, bloodier conflict in the Middle East, but no one in the West wants to acknowledge it, prepare for it, or begin to fight it.

(more…)

Alaska’s great Senator Ted Stevens, the deserving target of much ridicule recently, has been outted as the senator who placed a secret hold on government earmarking legislation. (via Slashdot and Instapundit) What happened:

Until now, it was a political whodunnit as to who quietly blocked legislation introduced by Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., that would create a searchable database of government contracts, grants, insurance, loans and financial assistance, worth $2.5 trillion last year.

While speculation centered on Stevens, there was no confirmation. Under Senate rules, the hold remains cloaked in secrecy unless the senator who places it lifts it.

Here’s Senator Coburn’s syopsis of the bill, which sounds like common sense and something our gluttonous government needs.

So, why did Stevens block it? He wanted a “cost-benefit analysis” ran on the thing and was worried more bureaucracy would be created. These worries in and of themselves are not necessarily bad, but the worries — if even sincere! — are misplaced for sure. The cost of running a database like the one proposed would be fairly minimal, especially when compared to the benefits provided to Joe Taxpayer. My job entails administrating a platform that I’d imagine would be fairly comparable to what would be required for this database in terms of volume of information, traffic loads, and complexity, and I’m just one tiny, tiny corner of the company’s revenue and costs. And of course, a negligible amount of bureaucracy would be created (somebody’s gotta admin the thing, right?), but again this would be minimal when compared to the already enormous bloat of the federal government.

So, congratulations, Senator Stevens, you suck at representing the people. I hope you catch a whole lot of electoral hell for this, and your 37+ years of public service come to an end. I know if I was still an Alaskan resident you would have lost my vote.

This sounds almost too good to be true.

A British engineering firm has put together a high-performance hybrid version of BMW’s Mini Cooper. The PML Mini QED has a top speed of 150 mph, a 0-60 mph time of 4.5 seconds. The car uses a small gasoline engine with four 160 horsepower electric motors — one on each wheel. The car has been designed to run for four hours of combined urban/extra urban driving, powered only by a battery and bank of ultra capacitors. The QED supports an all-electric range of 200-250 miles and has a total range of about 932 miles (1,500 km). For longer journeys at higher speeds, a small conventional internal combustion engine (ICE) is used to re-charge the battery. In this hybrid mode, fuel economies of up to 80mpg can be achieved.

I predict within 10 years a lot of the technology in this car will be fairly mainstream and will revolutionize our energy consumption. Of course, a lot of people will dismiss my optimism and point to Big Oil, to which I respond: Big Oil can’t stop something millions of consumers want.

(via Soini on IM)

I had some answers that I think would rank me very high on the nerd scale, but then I had a few answer that ranked me quite low. I dare you to beat me.

Text messaging and ringtones hot stuff amongst Iraqi youth. Seeing as my job is all about text messaging and ringtones, this article is pretty interesting for me. Here in the US you can order ringtones via text messages. In Iraq, they’re bought on special CDs. Here’s a some snippets:

In a city bereft of entertainment, text messaging and swapping ringtones are all the rage for young Iraqis trying to lighten their lives. Most restaurants, cafes and movies have closed due to the country’s security situation.

The content of the text messages and ringtones speak volumes about the state of affairs here: jokes and songs about suicide bombings, sectarianism, power outages, gas prices, Saddam Hussein and George Bush.

Cellphone shops, the only crowded stores these days, sell special CDs with ringtones at about $2 apiece. Collections of short jokes especially written for texters are best-sellers.

. . .

The daily reality of violence and explosions has influenced every aspect of Iraqi life — including love notes. “I send you the tanks of my love, bullets of my admiration and a rocket of my yearning,” one popular message reads.

A popular ringtone features the music from Coolio’s Gangsta’s Paradise. But the local version includes a voice similar to Saddam’s rapping in English: “I’m Saddam, I don’t have a bomb/Bush wants to kick me/I don’t know why/smoking weed and getting high/I know the devil’s by my side.”

The song concludes with: “My days are over and I’m gonna die/all I need is chili fries” as a crowd yells “Goodbye forever, may God curse you.”

Competing with Saddam for the most popular song in Iraq today is Iraqi pop star Hossam al-Rassam — “Ma, I’ve been stung by a scorpion.” Its sensual lyrics challenge widespread conservatism in Iraq by talking about a girl’s lips and perfume “that make you live longer.”

Rasha Tareq, 23, has al-Rassam’s ringtone, as well as dozens of others by Lebanese singers. The most expensive ringtones include songs by Egyptian pop star Amr Diab.

“Ah, well, Dad pays for all that,” she said.

Dad also paid for her Nokia 7660 as well as the eight other models she has bought since cellphones first hit the market after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Iraq has a long way to go before it’s back to “normal,” but I take this as a sign that it’s getting there.

I felt productive today, so I decided to channel all of that productivity into this blog, and now I’m spent.

I upgraded to Wordpress 2.0.4 painlessly. It has some “security fixes” which I’m hoping will choke off the last bit of comment spam that is trickling through my impressive barriers.

I finally got my del.icio.us links integrated into the blog. You’ll find them on the right side bar. I think I’ll start using del.icio.us a whole lot more now.

I’ve also made some minor cosmetic tweaks. Nothing spectacular though.

My friends and I had been looking forward to Snakes on a Plane for many months. I can’t remember which one of us spotted it first (I think I saw something about it early this year at Ain’t It Cool), but SoaP Fever quickly spread amongst the clan. I honestly don’t remember the movie too much, but I will tell you this: it does not disappoint. It was easily the best movie-going experience of my entire life. If every movie was as fun as this movie, I would gladly pay $20 for a ticket. Why was this movie so thoroughly excellent? Two words: audience participation. The movie itself was not good, but the reactions it drew out of the crowd were hilariously entertaining. I believe I was laughing almost the whole movie. For example, the moment Samuel L. Jackson walked on screen, the theater immediately erupted in cheering and a standing ovation (by some). All during the movie there was at least some type of audience reaction: quiet scenes were drowned out by the entire crowd hissing, exaggerated screams were made during gruesome deaths, sage advice was shouted out to the doomed characters, and always laughter.

If you love campy B-movies and love audience participation, go see this movie immediately before SoaP fever dies off.

Pros: Samuel L. Jackson, the other movie goers, Snakes. on. a. plane.
Cons: None.

My grandpa sent me his autobiography today. Clocking in at just under 400 pages, it looks like it will be the authoritative memoir of Grandpa Barnett. It covers his 28 years as a chaplain in the US Air Force during which he served at 11 bases, including bases in Korea, Newfoundland, and Japan. My only complaint so far is that it’s got a textbookish look about it, which gives me some educational flashbacks. It’d be nice to write a book like this some day. I figure this blog gives me a jump start of sorts . . .

Not sure if this is intentional, but it’s cool.

I’m so nervous.

My new computer.

/drool.

UPDATE: I need money. I am suffering from a serious illness that requires a very expensive pill (roughly $2685 for one). If I don’t get the medicine I die immediately! Please send money! Don’t let me die! Kthxbye!

Here are selected pictures from Fluger’s wedding yesterday. These are pics I liked best and don’t necessarily represent all of the good and serious photos. For this little gallery I was focusing on the funner shots. I hope you enjoy. If you would like any for printing, feel free to contact me, and I’ll ship ‘em right out.

I’ve long wanted to make a post about what software applications I use on a day to day basis. It would have been annoying to compile a list of the software and all the necessary links to the various sites. Luckily, there’s a site out there that does this for me now. Here’s my I Use This profile.

Fluger got married yesterday. I was the photographer for the wedding, and I had a lot of fun. So far I’m happy with how the photos turned out and I haven’t even slathered on the Photoshop love yet.

Here’s one with me in it because I’m egotistical and this is my blog (see if you can spot me):

All of those guys were on my old dorm floor. 5th Hill forever!

I’ll see if I can get a little photo album from the wedding uploaded soon.

As per Chris’s suggestion, click below to compare the above photo to a photo from our freshman year.
(more…)