I'm Back, Tanned, Rested, and Ready...

...to take another blog-cation. My birthday was nice, had many well-wishes from friends, played a good gig that evening and it took three whole days to recover.

My liver is glad it's over.

Anywho, my posts will be a bit less frequent, as I have a lot to do around the hacienda cleaning up for the holidays. I know I've said that before, but this time I mean it. Familial duties and all that.

So, here's a few tidbits until I can find my muse once more. I know I put it somewhere...

I was watching the ESPN talking heads yesterday before Tim Tebow's first NFL start as quarterback for the Denver Broncos against the Miami Dolphins and the hostility towards him was palpable for reasons I've yet to fathom. Petty and nitpicking is what it really was. There was even a segue from a commercial that went, "Tim Tebow, love him or hate him..."

That got me thinking: exactly what did Tebow do to cause anyone to hate him? Did he beat up his wife? Did he get in a fight in a bar? Has he shot anyone in a fight in a bar? Caused any dogs to die?

Did I miss something? Or are the sportsheads just a wee bit jealous and maybe scared that Tebow's a better man than they are?

RIP Dan Wheldon. Prayers go out to your wife, children, and family.

The OWSers are getting more and more repugnant as time goes by. Arrests, garbage everywhere, no sanitary facilities, no permits. And they compare themselves to Tea Partiers? I want the GOP to hang these infantile protesters around the neck of every Democrat who embraces them, just to provide a real contrast with the rest of America.

Dumb, stupid and ignorant is no way to go through life. They know less than nothing about how the world works, how capitalism should work, nor how much of anything works. I'm reminded of the scene in Talladega Nights where Texas Ranger points a gushing garden hose inside the neighbors' open window while yelling, "Anarchy, anarchy! I don't know what it means, but I like it!"

Oh, I guess I should put a link to something in here somewhere. This is encouraging, World Power Swings Back to America. They need to give us another year before that happens in earnest, so we can rid ourselves of the Socialists, Marxists and Progressives that have infested the left and Washington. Many politicians have to be defeated in November of 2012, like Nancy Pelosi, Barney Frank, Dianne Fienstein, Olympia Snowe, and their RINO squish enablers like Lindsey Graham and Mitch McConnell. Even then, we'll need some time to repeal everything that Obama has done. That'll take a while, but do it we much.

I've laid out my plan, albeit in bits and pieces here over the years, but it's imperative that we undo everything that the left has instituted in Washington before we can start to think about leading the world again. And by leading, I mean by example. We should retrench and rebuild our nation, which has been gradually destroyed from within by our enemies, and let the rest of the world do as it pleases. We have enough natural resources to become truly self-sufficient.

We should do it as soon as possible. Our very survival may depend on it,

I'm Taking a Blog-cation Until Monday

I haven't done this in a while, but I'll be taking the rest of the week off. I'm following in the footsteps of my reluctant mentor, Ace, who just returned from his vacation. Besides, tomorrow is my birthday, so if past celebrations are any indicator, I'll need all that time to sober up, raise bail money, begin rehab, recharge my batteries, so to speak.

So, in my absence, please feel free to poke around in the archives. Or submit ideas for a post in the comments. Or, as some of you geeks have done, post some more info on LightSquared's Grand Debacle. Either way, I want all 11 of you to hang out and enjoy yourselves.

Try not to trash the place, 'k?

In the mean time, I'll leave y'all with one link that comes courtesy of one of the Moron Horde, Vic, who's battling cancer as we speak. As you guys know, I recently lost one of my bestest musician buddies to liver cancer, so my thoughts and prayers are with him, even though we only know each other through our keyboards.

Here's the link: Primary Sources. It's from the Heritage Foundation to some of the Founding Fathers' original writings on government. It should be required reading in schools, but we all know that our precious little ones really only need to know why Heather has two Mommies instead, don't we?

Snark I much.

Anyway, y'all have fun and hoist one for me this fine weekend. In fact, I have a gig tomorrow at a local bedroom community down here that throws a street party on the second Thursday of the month, every month. How nice of them to shut down the town and have a party for my birthday. They really shouldn't have.

Y'all be good and I'll see you on Monday.

A Couple of Radical, Far-Right Protest Songs

...and by "radical, far-right," I mean average Americans as seen through the lens of the decidedly leftist media and their Washington enablers.

I suppose if the "Teat Party" can do it, so can we.

These protests are becoming rather tedious. I suppose there will always be a certain sector of America that just doesn't have a clue about how the real world works. Having been indoctrinated throughout their lives to leftist thought in schools and being forced to watch such drivel as AlGore's An Inconvenient Truth and the Story of Stuff in class, they can no longer think for themselves. It sure doesn't help when their parents don't have critical thinking skills, either.

I'll carbon-date myself once again to say that there was once a time when one outgrew such infantilities. Things like having a job and raising a family did much to teach a young adult the way of the world. But since we've entered The Fallacious Period of man, this seems lost.

I am most definitely in the wrong line of work. I should become a Professional Protester. It pays much more than I'm making now, but from what I've read, the working conditions are somewhat less than ideal. (h/t to Ace) Whoa, maybe that's not such a good idea after all. It seems that the Axelturfers call for a "living wage," but won't pay their stooges that much? (h/t Insty) It seems like there's an Alinsky Rule for that. Number 4, I believe.

OK, time's getting short, so here are the songs I promised.

Hank Williams Jr. tells ESPN and Fox and Friends to take this job and shove it, kinda sorta.



And this would be a great counter-protest song, too. Ignore the video part, as it seems to have nothing at all to do with the song itself, plus it's NSFW.



Do the protesters get a bonus for crapping on a police car? If not, why not?

The Fallacious Period of Man

If you or I were anthropologists, we might be tempted to look at this particular age with a jaundiced eye. Everywhere there are false claims, exaggerations, wild theories, misinformation and other evidence that something is missing. While that’s certainly nothing new, technology is enabling bullshit to be more widespread than ever.

I call this Man’s Fallacious Period. I’ve mentioned it before.

It’s not like we’re stupid or anything. Certainly there are and always have been intelligent people. The American Twentieth Century is an example of the world’s best and brightest people doing what they did best: dreaming of a better world and then bringing those dreams to fruition, thus raising the living standard of not only America but the world to levels never before thought possible, creating wealth for themselves and others in the process.

The most recent example of this was the late Steve Jobs.

But intermingled with all this was fallacy. In a way, Mr. Jobs helped to promote this, which is not to diminish his considerable contributions. He could be likened to the first person who harnessed fire. What you do with it after that is up to you.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the political arena. As candidates jockey for power, they say a great many things, some true, some not.

It’s along about here that I draw the analogy between facts and fire, and present, in no particular order, a few of these fallacies.

1. Capitalism is unfair.

2. Mankind is killing the planet.

3. The Tea Party is racist.

4. President Obama knows what he’s doing.

5. America is the world’s Bad Guy.

6. Lady Gaga is a shy, retiring, fashion maven.

I may have made that last one up.

Anyway, you get my point. We’re presented with a great many ideas, some good, some not so good. The question then becomes, “How do I tell the difference?”

In my experience, you need some sort of inner GPS system in order to navigate the seas of fallacies that crash across your bow and threaten to wash you overboard. It’s essential that you remove your emotional reaction from any decision. To quote that great philosopher/warrior Obi Wan Kenobi, your thoughts can deceive you, being as they are so closely linked to emotion. That’s the first thing.

Once free from the ravages of emotion, you can remain calm and take your time exploring as many sides of an issue as possible, testing them against your own experience and those of others. As I used to tell BackwardsBoy’sBoy, some mistakes are so big, you don’t need to make them yourself, you can watch what happens when someone else screws up to see the results. Sometimes, all you need to do is wait for the correct answer to come to you, as it inevitably will. Patience really is a virtue.

We’re currently having our beliefs tested against reality. What works? What fails? Even more importantly, am I seeing things accurately and truthfully?

I sure hope so.

And I hope the same thing for you.

Friday Bits of Tid - Occupation Edition

"What do we want?"

"A Friday Bits of Tid post!"

"When do we want it?"

"Now!"

Do you feel all occupied? I know I do.

It's good to know that all the protesters in the Occupy Wall Street demonstration have completely shunned any and all contact with the corporate world they claim to despise. I'm certain that they won't be using their iPhones or iPods or iPads, or using the greedy, corporate bathrooms at places like McDonalds. Or wearing any of those hip clothes, or shoes, or hoodies decorated with greedy, corporate logos made with slave child labor in China.

And they certainly wouldn't try anything as nefarious as Photoshopping Google pictures to make the protest crowd appear to be much larger than it is. They would never do that.

OK, let's occupy this blog, shall we?

At least our protests haven't gone to the dogs, like they have in Greece.

Fido has his own bed, food dish and now, his very own commercial, complete with a high-frequency sound that we humans can't hear.

Capitalism is alive and well, thank you, as evidenced by this new line of Hallmark layoff greeting cards. "Welcome to Funemployment!"

Remember Russian premier Vladimir Putin's scuba dive where he discovered some ancient Greek artifacts? It was faked. Color me surprised.

If they had brains, they wouldn't be thieves. This guy and this guy miraculously managed to snap their own mug shot with smartphones they stole. Now, if they turned on the GPS location feature, it'd be a simple matter for the police to find them.

Being a "double threat" in football usually means playing on both offense and defense. Here's a new wrinkle: place kicker and homecoming queen.

And finally, I can understand having a stereo on a motorcycle, but this takes it to a whole 'nother level.



Ride Rock on, dudes.

RIP, Steve Jobs

Apple Computer founder Steve Jobs, passed away from cancer yesterday.

His bio is here, and pretty much everywhere else you care to click. Even if you're not a Mac user, you can't deny his impact on the personal computer industry.

He was an innovator, businessman, geek, visionary, and American.

Rest in Peace, Steve. You will be missed.

We're Already Losing the Trade War Unecessarily

Short post today. I'm still reeling over this LightSquared story. Maybe I can find a tie-in, who knows?

I find it interesting that we're in a grand and glorious new age of global commerce. It could be a time of economic renewal for us as a nation, but there are a couple of things that are missing. Like the spirit of competition and a willingness not only to keep up with your competitition, but to do better and excel.

We're being told that we must be a player in this new world order. But, how can we compete if our own government is determined to tie our hands with regulations that are designed to make sure we can't?

All eleven of you know that I'm a firm believer in capitalism and the unfettered free market. But what we have today is anything but. I've outlined the tsunami of regulations that spewed from the 111th Pelosi- and Reid-led Congress. It may be gone, but the damage remains. In fact, we don't have a handle on the actual amount of economic havoc wreaked by this administration, as the regulations are still being written. It's the main driver behind the uncertainty that bedevils our economy.

Now, there's a bill winding its way through the current Congress that aims to put some pressure on China to allow their currency value to float like every other country. Needless to say, the Chineses aren't very happy with this, as they're now threatening a trade war with us.

How nice.

The fact is that we're already losing the trade war, as evidenced by our global trade imbalance. Billions and billions of our dollars are going out of the country and into the coffers of our trade enemies. All this is perfectly justifiable to this administration who sees the US as the bad guy who, because of our success, needs to pay reparations to the rest of the world.

In a sane world where everything wasn't backwards, other countries would be imitating our success instead of robbing us. They'd be reforming themselves instead of us. They would be upping their game, not tearing ours down.

Another thing that I've proposed is to withdraw from this whole idea of a global economy and concentrate on ourselves first. We have the natural resources and the business saavy to do it, just not the political will.

We could drill for our own oil, which we have in abundance, curiously, thanks to the Big Green Movement that has made it essentially forbidden to use. We could be constructing new nuclear plants and oil refineries today. We could stop using food for fuel, ending this outrageously idiotic notion of "American Ethanol" as the cure for our energy woes.

We could regain our manufacturing ability, which we destroyed through NAFTA and GATT. We could reduce the role of government in our economy. We could stop companies from interfering with our own technology, as in LightSquared, where we're shooting ourselves in the foot with a plan to seriously hamper our GPS system (see, I knew I'd find a tie-in).

In short, there's so much we could be doing for ourselves, but aren't.

It's all about the numbers, which so many in Washington either cannot or will not understand. We have met the enemy, and it is us.

One last thingy. I posted a chart by the Moron John E on Monday about numbers. Thanks to LauraW's hump, there's a better version making the rounds of teh Interwebs. This one features dancing girls with fans, champagne bubbles and a big band.

Well, not really.



You may now return to your life.

How Did LightSquared Get This Far Despite Bad Test Results?

I've been doing some of that exhaustive Interwebs research into LightSquared and the results are, well, I'll let you decide. I already made up my mind.

The original idea for LS is a good one, namely to provide broadband service without cables. As many in the wireless world will attest, it's far easier and cheaper to construct a cellular tower than to run cables to individual homes. But, in execution, the radio frequency that LS will use to bypass those cables gets perilously close to the band that our Global Positioning System uses, interfering in what has been called a "quiet neighborhood." This interference has some pretty nasty side effects.

LightSquared's plan would have the necessary towers located on the ground, and testing proved that these towers would prevent GPS signals from reaching users. While that might sound like a minor inconvenience, I doubt if you would think it was very minor if you called 911 in the middle of a heart attack and the first responders suddenly lost their ability to find you. Or if the airplane you were flying in was on approach to the runway and discovered it didn't know where it was.

And this administration thinks that won't be a problem.

In fact, the Federal Communications Commission issued a special waiver for just for LS so it could operate even after it was pretty much proven that their towers would interfere with ground reception of the GPS signal.

This is beyond incompetence and enters the realm I consider to be dangerous.

A couple of weeks ago, I posted this link to an FAA paper (thanks to a fellow Moron over at Ace's Place) that outlines the negative effect of LightSquared's interference with ground reception. It wasn't the only test.

Here's an overview of their plan from Computerworld.com.

The LightSquared interference debate is among the most heated in recent years in the U.S., pitting the critical and widely used GPS service against a new mobile data entrant with a new technology and business model.

Here's what Congress was told.

LightSquared’s intended deployment of their high-power terrestrial broadband system should not be allowed to commence commercial operations until the identified problems are resolved,” said Anthony Russo, director of the federal National Coordination Office for Space-Based Positioning, Navigation and Timing.

The FCC was informed.

The document describing the testing states that the Lightsquared initiative “will have a severe impact on the GPS band” and “will create a disastrous interference problem for GPS receiver operation to the point where GPS receivers will cease to operate (complete loss of fix) when in the vicinity of these transmitters.”

The Aircraft Owners and Pilot's Association had this to say...

Subsequent testing confirmed concerns of aviation and other GPS users that low-powered GPS signals are overwhelmed by the strong signals from LightSquared’s ground transmitters.

Feel safe yet? Feel like the federal government is acting in your best interests and that of the public?

Michelle Malkin digs a bit deeper.

Despite industry-wide protests, the firm somehow received fast-track approval for a special FCC waiver that grants LightSquared the right to use wireless spectrum to build out a national 4G wireless network on the cheap. Ken Boehm, of the conservative watchdog National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) in Washington, D.C., summed up the deal earlier this year: “LightSquared will get the spectrum for a song, while its competitors (e.g., AT&T and Verizon) have to spend billions.”



The current “fix” LightSquared proposes to address the interference problems is a costly, conceptual pipe dream that could require massive retrofitting of millions of handheld GPS devices. GPS expert Eric Gakstatter scoffs: “I’ve been pretty open-minded about LightSquared proposing a solution, but this really insults our intelligence. (A)s we’ve seen previously with LightSquared, it’s not about finding a practical solution for the GPS user community; it’s all about selling an idea to the FCC. The problem is that the FCC doesn’t have to live with LightSquared’s half-baked ‘solution’; we do.”

So, how did this happen? President Obama was an early investor.

And you'll never guess in a million years who else is involved in this danger to the public safety. None other than your fiend and mine, the anti-Christ, George Soros.

As Republican lawmakers begin to dig into the White House's cozy relationship with a startup wireless company and the wealthy Democratic donor who owns it, a new character has appeared on the story's edges: liberal superdonor, conservative bete noire and controversial investor George Soros.



Soros reportedly invested in the telecom company LightSquared through a hedge fund, and many of the nonprofits he finances have backed LightSquared in regulatory and policy disputes.

I propose one more test for LightSquared and it's a very simple one: how long will it take for everyone responsible for this to rot in a jail cell?

Shouldn’t We Fear Global Cooling More Than Warming?

This Monday, I thought I’d spare you the economic gloom and doom that I normally bestow upon you on this first day of the workweek.

Well, not really, here’s a chart you should see: The Obama Presidency by the Numbers.

No, today I want to explore a point that one of my fellow Morons made a couple of weeks ago in a thread over at Ace’s Place and mentioned in the title. Maybe we’re being told the wrong thing in this whole “global warming” debate.

Snark I much.

There’s no doubt in my mind, and in the minds of others who doubt the entire notion of mankind’s ability to change the global climate, that we’re being lied to in order to be manipulated politically and to act against our own best interests. You need not be a climate scientist to understand what’s going on, all you need is a healthy dose of skepticism and your own common sense.

Let’s set aside the fact that some in government are relying on a group of people who haven’t the slightest idea what the weather will be one month from today to tell us what the climate will be in one hundred years, like a certain governor from a state whose name rhymes with New Jersey, one Chris Christie. He seems perfectly content to abdicate his personal responsibility to question this subject. If he were the kind of politician we need, he’d be reaching his own conclusions based on his own knowledge and intuition.

We’re being preached at, normally on a beautiful, picture-postcard, Chamber of Commerce endorsed day that the Earth is in “crisis” and we’re to blame. Every action we innocently take as we go about our daily life is causing irreparable harm to the planet and we need to revert to some past technological time and forego our modern lives in order to stop it.

But what if “global warming” actually served to work in favor of mankind? Bear with me for a moment.

Wouldn’t a warmer global temperature be better suited for growing crops? Wouldn’t that help us feed a growing world population by increasing the amount of productive land?

I’m just asking here.

What are we so scared of? Al Gore seems to be the political equivalent of Chicken Little, upon whose head an acorn fell, causing said youthful chick to fear something for no reason. Except in Gore’s case, he wanted to make a lot of money from it through his very dubious carbon exchange program, which has since proven (thankfully) to be a bust.

Another thing that these global scaremongers seem to forget is man’s ability to adapt to changing circumstances. While we could adapt to cold, we’d still find ourselves at the mercy of the elements whichever way the climate went, warmer or colder. But wouldn’t we be better off if the Earth did get just a little bit warmer? Personally, I think more farmland and more favorable growing conditions would be a good thing for everybody.

It’s rather difficult to plow frozen land from what I understand.