Yearly Archives: 2005

That’s Gay

There’s an AP article out today in which rapper Kanye West talks about using the word “gay” as an antonym to hip-hop (or presumably to “cool” or whatever you might use as a positive affirmation when you’re with your friends). The article can be found here:

Kanye West Calls for End to Gay Bashing

It just happens that I’ve recently considered my own use of the word gay as a negative affirmation. Now, I believe that gay people should be treated equally, not just under the law but by society too, and I know that the usage I’m describing of the word gay derived out of a negative connotation towards homosexuality. I just don’t care about the origin of this or any other word.

The reason I don’t care is that words can and do have multiple meanings and their origin is often irrelevant. The nature of language is that it evolves. A word can start out meaning one thing, be used to mean something else, and end up taking on an entirely new meaning (or meanings).

Think about it for a minute. Do you go around speaking ancient Greek or Latin? No. Language has evolved so far away from those languages that we can no longer recognize even a tiny fraction of them. Granted, these changes happen slowly, one word at a time. Sometimes the meaning changes, sometimes the pronunciation, and sometimes the spelling. The point is that they do happen.

Anytime you get into an argument over semantics you’ve moved away from discussing the actual issue. People need to be a little less sensitive and a little more focused. In this instance they should be more focused on equality.

Let me jump back to the evolution of language real quick. I have another beef to bring up. I’m from Texas and I’m sick and tired of people who say “ain’t isn’t a word” or “y’all isn’t a word” or “<insert southern word, expression, or contraction here> isn’t a word.” They are all words. If I can use it in a sentence and you can understand it, it’s a word. Again, the nature of language is that it is constantly evolving, whether you want it to or not. And anybody who says otherwise is soooo gay.

Update: I just realized that my calling things gay almost certainly arose from watching too much South Park. The creators of which are almost certainly gay. Those kids call everything gay. I want to be just like Matt Stone and/or Trey Parker when I grow up (except for the part about being gay).

Site Development

OK, posting has tapered off recently, but that’s because I’m working to get the site launched. The fact of the matter is, all of this content is going to be historical anyway. Nobody can read this yet (as of this writing). I’m just trying to fill in some content so there will be something there when the site launches.

So far it’s been mostly political, but I want to balance that with web design and development items as well as posts on a broader range of other topics.

Ok, going back to work now. Hopefully I’ll get this sucker launched soon.

Green Engineering

I’m a big fan of environmentalism that doesn’t change the way we live. Mainly because I think it’s just impossible to get the majority of people to make sacrifices for something that they can’t see as tangible. Any effort by the rest of us is pretty meaningless if the majority isn’t joining in.

I’m also a big fan of architecture and architectural engineering. And science.

That’s why I’m so fascinated by the developments that continue to take place with materials sciences and all of the interactivity between architects and other engineering fields that are working to incorporate energy producing and/or green technologies into new buildings.

A recent article in Wired called Scrubbing Bubbles Hit the Streets talks about a concrete that can break down vehicle exhaust. The “Dives in Misericordia church” in Rome is one example of a building made of self-cleaning concrete. The more expensive material was chosen not because of it’s green properties, but because of it’s self-cleaning properties that would help keep the ultra-white facade of the building pristine for years to come.


The Dives in Misercordia Church

The proposed Freedom Tower, proposed to replace the World Trade Center buildings, will have a wind farm, solar farm, and employ energy efficient technologies all in an effort to reduce it’s impact on the environment. You can read a Wired article about that here. Putting a wind farm on top of a skyscraper just makes sense. It certainly doesn’t make the skyline any less attractive, especially if the turbines are incorporated in narrow tunnels inside the building. Along with solar windows and natural lighting tubes that feed sunlight throughout the building, the impact of these buildings can be greatly reduced.


The Proposed Freedom Tower

Last week HGTV ran a show called I Want That! that featured solar roofing shingles that look like shiny shingles. They actually look more attractive than the ugly black tar shingles you typically see on most roofs and they don’t appear to reflect more light than your average tiled roof, so they won’t blind your neighbors. With subsidies you could recoup the cost of the shingles in 7-10 years and they have a lifespan of 25-30 years.

It’s always fun reading about these projects and it makes you feel good about the future. However, without widespread adoption, we are right back where we started with little to no actual benefit. Hopefully the rising costs of fossil fuels, continuing government subsidies, and some economies of scale will combine to create the perfect storm for widespread adoption of even a few of the green technologies that are out there.

Now I get it…

From “Why conservatives feel free to cast the first stone“:

if Jesus were around today and a woman taken in adultery ran to him for protection and he said to the crowd, Let the one who is without sin cast the first stone, forty-six Republican adulterers would bean her with rocks.

Welcome Lance Mannion. You are the first person on my blogroll. Everybody else: go read the whole article.

One Fingered Victory Salute

Apparently Bush flipped off the media recently. The comments section from that page led me to this older clip of Bush doing the same thing. I found the older one to be much funnier. Note how he can stop giggling like a schoolgirl at how amusing he finds himself. (I often do the same thing although I do not profess it to be one of my finer points.)

That video would have made a great campaign ad in the last election. Unedited, with no text or voice overs of any kind. Just raw footage with a tag at the end about “restoring dignity” to the White House.

Once again, the best stuff is found in the comments section.

Now You Know… Global Warming

I’m not a big fan of AOL and I never visit their website. (Why would I? I’m not a subscriber.) An article in Wired (which I visit daily) led me to their site, and in turn led me to this page on global warming: “Now You Know… Global Warming.”

It looks like your typical National Geographic tutorial for students but I wanted to link to it because it isn’t just a single article. It’s an entire mini-site with lots of information that can be easily understood by anybody.

Riffing on Vista

Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols has a funny, tongue-in-cheeck article about the upcoming Microsoft Vista OS (formerly Longhorn) over at eWeek titled “I’m So Excited by Microsoft Vista. Not.” Here is an excerpt:

Like, wow, Microsoft’s Vista, the former Longhorn, is now only more than a year away.

With this latest beta, we’re finally going to see lots of really new, cool features.

For example, it’s going to have speech recognition! How cool is that!?

Campaign Finance Problem?

Ambivablog has a post titled Here’s Why Dems Will Lose Again. More interesting than the article (sorry amba) was a comment by Rob from Roborant:

The Dems have maneuvered themselves into an odd position. They used campaign finance reform as a weapon and plank in their campaigns. This made individual contributions extremely important. It also made third-party loophole organizations like moveon.org extremely important.

Then they found out that the disturbed fringe of the party was the best source of individual donations – both to the party and to the other organizations. So, now they have to play to the fringe for money, but appeal to the center for enough votes to win.

I think they keep losing until this problem is solved. Imagine how screwed the Repubs would be if all of their money was coming from the religious right…

I’m not sure how this all came to be, but I certainly blame Karl Rove.

Not only is it insightful, but the last line made me laugh out loud.

Can a Spam Filter Play Chess

Thanks to Kottke for pointing me to this diversion, which effectively prevented me from getting work done this morning. It’s a step-by-step tutorial for teaching your Bayesian spam filter to play chess with analysis on how well it performs. It’s written in plain English (except for the code snippets) so you don’t have to have much programming knowledge to follow along.

Open Letter to John McCain

Senator McCain,

I’m writing you because of my disappointment, which peaked during your recent Hardball appearance. As a liberal (formerly Green, now Democrat) I have always felt that you were one of the few Republicans that I trusted and could vote for.

I’ve understood the reasons why you’ve chosen to stand by Bush, particularly since 2003 and his reelection campaign. I can only assume the greater goal here is to get the nomination for your party in 2008. Putting aside my doubts that Bush will show you anywhere near the same loyalty that you’ve shown him, there is a greater issue here.

Until now, your endorsements have still maintained an edge of truth. You’ve stuck by your man and your party but you avoided crossing over into blatant politicizing and outright lying. Until Hardball. I’m sorry I can’t use a softer word, but I know that you know that Joseph Wilson did not claim he was sent to Niger by Dick Cheney. And to claim otherwise on national television IS a lie. There was more that you said during that interview, parroting the misleading talking points put out by your party, but I’m going to bother discussing them.

I just want to relay a short, simple message: even if you get the nomination in 2008, I no longer have the trust in you that I once did. I have grave doubts as to whether or not I would be able to support and vote for you.

Sincerely,

A Concerned Citizen

Confirm and Move On

According to pretty much everybody, the numbers add up that John Roberts will be confirmed no matter what. He doesn’t stand up as an extraordinary candidate, at least according to two Republican members of the Gang of 14. That means no filibuster. Even if the Democrats tried, the Republicans would almost certainly have the 50 votes to override the filibuster (the 48 Republicans who were not part of the Gang of 14 and two of those who were, plus a tiebreaker by the V.P.).

Ok, putting aside math, most people agree that his ideology is somewhere between an O’Connor and a Rehnquist. That means there were plenty of candidates who would have been worse. Considering that the Republicans control the White House and both chambers of Congress, it’s about the best we could have hoped for. If Rehnquist was retiring too, it might have been a different ballgame. The Dems would have had more ground to argue for at least one moderate since they knew there were going to get at least one more just like Rehnquist. They would have had more bargaining room too, since the more right-wing nominee would have been easier to classify as an “extraordinary circumstance” to filibuster.

So, there really isn’t anything left to do but put on a show, confirm the man, and move on. It’s in the interest of the Left to do that as quickly as possible. Why? So we can get back to the Plame scandal. The White House is trying to put an end to that before it gains any more traction in the minds of the American public. I’m tired of the right-wingers controlling the media like this. We need to make sure this issue stays front and center.

Nevermind that crime(s) were most likely committed. These people outed a CIA operative and endangered national interests. Rather than disavowing such behavior, the Republican party has been busy circling the wagons to protect their own. Proving, once again, that they care more about power than anything else. Including national security.

So let’s get Roberts into his shiny new black robe just as fast as we can.

The Lonely Apple Repairman?

I just read an article over at Forbes.com titled “The Lonely Apple Repairman?” that detailed the recent travails of the author, David A. Andelman, who had to wait 60 hours for his Mac to be repaired at the Apple store in NY. I can sympathize with his angst over the temporary loss of his ‘Net umbilical cord, even if I thought the article was a bit overdramatic.

The end of the article posed a question that routinely pops up from tech writers: shouldn’t computers be more stable by now? He points to one of the usual (straw man) suspects for comparison: the modern automobile. I have two arguments or comments for Mr. Andelman in response to his story:

First, cars haven’t changed all that much since they showed up a century ago. Every piece that has been added went through years of research and careful integration into the car. For safety reasons most people would argue that is a good thing. But from the standpoint of innovation, it really sucks. Computers, on the other hand, are all about innovation. Not only does the hardware continue to develop at an amazing rate, but the software may actually be outpacing the hardware.

I’m sure if we were to just stop making new bits and pieces for our computers and just spent all of our time refining what we currently have that we would have much more stable machines. But what a waste that would be. Stability is great, don’t get me wrong. And the software and hardware industries (but especially software) could certainly do a better job of creating more stable products, but there will always be a balancing act with innovation.

Second, knowing how to take care of my computer much better than I know how to take care of my car, I tend to experience more problems and sink more money into my automobile than I ever will on my computers. So it’s a spurious analogy at best.

It isn’t about free speech

I must be the only person who looks at the CIA leak case and doesn’t see an infringement upon free speech. There was nothing newsworthy or of value in publicizing the name of a CIA operative. It was, however, a federal crime that not only endangered the operative herself but U.S. national interests.

Had there been something newsworthy in the publication of that information, I could see an argument for protecting the source of that information.

Imagine the entire press core standing up and defending someone for yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater (the most overused example of why there are some limits on free speech). That is basically what is going on.

I understand the fear that reporters are standing on a slippery slope and that if the issue isn’t kept black and white that the government will come charging into the gray area and attempt to coerce more reporters to give up their sources in cases where the national security of our country hasn’t been jeopardized in some fashion. But this issue, like most others, is not black and white and they’re just going to have to live in the “reality based community” with the rest of us.

Now I’ll be the first to admit that I do not know the exact text of the law, but my understanding is that it is a federal crime to release the name of an undercover CIA operative. That being the case, a better solution would have been to charge Robert Novak for that crime. Then there wouldn’t have been any issues about protecting sources. That didn’t happen and it may be that a strict interpretation of the law didn’t allow for it. Since it didn’t happen, we have to deal with the situation as it stands.

If that means that Karl Rove ends up going to jail, well, that’s even better than Robert Novak. Of course, I wouldn’t expect that to happen in my wildest fantasies. I’m fairly confident that Rove could stand up at a press briefing and start reciting from a list of undercover operatives, thumb his nose at the reporters before leaving, and be held above the law by his boss. I don’t mind being a realist because I’m equally comforted by the fact that his entire party would suffer consequences at the voting booths commensurate with their actions. All it takes is a little patience.

In the meantime, I hope Miller enjoys her time in jail. I really do.