When you're dealing with the lower end of the intellectual spectrum, Democrats and Republicans tend to become pretty similar. Their reasons for voting are often equally uninformed or irrational. At the higher end though, there is a distinct difference based on what I've seen. Democrats tend to rely much more on third party analysis for their political opinions. It's pretty rare to see the "stats freaks" arguing for liberal or Democratic positions. Instead, the Democrat...
The Windows Media Player team still just doesn't get it. Or maybe they get it but their managers don't. I'm playing around with Windows Media Player 10 tech beta and it still has the basic flaws that every skinnable version of media player has had: It can't decide what it wants to be. Is it a regular Windows app or a custom one? Wow, two title bars on one app. And it's still confusing to a dumb guy like me how to actually select the skin. It should be way more obvious and tho...
So Kerry hasn't gotten much of a bounce from his convention. Is that a surprise? How many people are undecided at this point anyway? I just don't see how Bush can win, however. Consider this: IF Bush gets the same % of the female vote and the % of the African American vote that he got last time, he'll lose by 5 million votes. Does anyone here seriously think that there's a chance in hell that Bush is going to improve his stance with women and blacks in this election?
Kerry is demanding Bush implement the 9/11 commissions's recommendations immediately. This should scare you. Why? Because under the commission's design, the new intelligence czar would be part of the President's cabinet and have an office in the white house. You sure you want that? You sure you want some combined FBI/CIA master ultra intelligence czar to be working in the white house with relatively little oversight? Because that's what Kerry is demanding. Bush, by contr...
Had a great weekend at my uncle's. I took my telescope which is a Mead ETX 125. I can never get the results with it that I see on-line. After a lot of setup, I managed to see Jupiter and its moons. But let me be clear on what that means: Jupiter is a dot and its moons are tiny dots by it. I am using the equipment that came with it which is the 73 magnification lens that came wiht it. I don't have a "Barlow" lens yet which I suspect I need to get that to have any real luck. The pr...
I spent a lot of the day getting DesktopX 2.2 objects put together and testing. I'm trying to get DesktopX to respect it deserves. Here it is, the world's best, most flexible, lowest overhead, fastest, easiest to use "widget" creation application and yet there's still people anxious for Konfabulator for Windows or using Avedesk (which is nice) or Samurize or something else. So I've started assigning more engineers into creating content for it so that its coolness is more apparent....
While visiting NASA, John Kerry posed for the cameras and Nasa put the results up. Kerry, who apparently found the pictures unflattering, cried foul. And he cried foul loud enough to gain the attention of the national media and bloggers who turned a picture that nobody would likely have seen into one everyone is going to see. Sometimes, it's better to let sleeping dogs lie.
John Kerry and his supporters have made a lot of noise of his 4 months in Vietnam on a Swift boat. But what do the men who actually served with him think? http://www.swiftvets.com/ Overwhelmingly, they reject him. Described variously as a glory hound, he apparently took a home movie camera with him in which he reinacted various events in front of the camera in an effort to glorify what he did. I don't know enough on this to know how much of it is usual political propaganda or not. ...
Microsoft really needs to do something about Internet Explorer. I doubt most people are even aware but it has slowly evolved into being a huge bloated pig over the years. Hit Ctrl-Shift-Esc to bring up your task manager and see for yourself. It's always a little ironic when I read someone complaining about the meg or two of memory WindowBlinds uses or some other desktop enhancement when they're probably using IE. Mozilla, Opera, etc. are all much less resource intensive. And ye...
If you are curious to see how popular different sites are on the net, the tool I use is the Alexa toolbar. I know some programs list it as "spyware" but it really isn't, not in the bad sense anyway. Very often websites will claim to be incredibly popular but one check with Alexa will show just how popular they are. See link below.
Robert Reich has a new book that talks about the principles of liberalism, conserativism, and adds a new category "radcons". It's an interesting, if self-serving, look at things. I say self-serving because he seems to imagine that the Democratic party is being run by the warm fuzzy liberals he describes. But is that the case? Perhaps he should add one more category -- Radlib. Because apparently, in Reich's mind, based on his book and interviews, the radicals are all on the right.&nbs...
We're getting a lot of email from independent game developers about publishing their games on TotalGaming.net. This Question & Answer sessions will hopefully answer some of the more common questions satisfactorily. Q: How do I get my game on TotalGaming.net? A: Your best bet is to snail mail (not email) a kit to: Stardock Entertainment CO: Brad Wardell 17292 Farmington Rd. Livonia MI 48152 Why not ju...
I got this in my email today: A concerned Canadian has invited you to join the georgebush.ca petition and stand side by side with other Canadians that believe George W. Bush and his administration need to be voted out of power. As Canadians, we have a special opportunity to help inform our American friends exactly how Canada feels about the current US government headed by George Bush. This November 2nd, we can't vote but we certainly can make our voices heard. Join the growing list of...
There's a great discussion on one of my favorite websites, Quarter To Three about why PC sales are in decline which I wrote about here . Brett Todd and I are taking different approaches. He makes a good argument that basically boils down to this: It's so easy to download games illegally that increasing numbers of people are doing so and that is now showing a real impact on the bottom line. Here's our discussion. Brett writes: Brad, this assumes that everyone shares you...
Am I the only Ultimate Spider-Man addict around here? I've been collecting them for the past couple of years. They start the Spider-Man mythos over at the start and really modernize it with Peter Parker a 15 year old kid. If you have any interest in Spider-Man or comic books, I really recommend these. They're well written and the artwork is terrific.