Biker "Hey."

Moose "Sup?"

B "Just cruisin', gonna chill a bit."

M "Cool."

B "Cool."

M "Whoa... Dude, are those the new Avid X0 hydraulic brakes?"

B "Yeah, just got them off eBay. Tryin' 'em out."

M "Sweet. Oh shit, that was my mom bellowing, gotta bounce."

B "Seeya."

M "Peace."

*cringe* whatever campaign advisor/think-tank came up with that deserves a swift kick in the nuts.

snippets from the press release:

[...] "by ideas raised at a grassroots Obama fundraiser" [...] "Parents and older siblings designed and provided the T-Shirts and the banner" [...]

"As Sunday approached, a neighbor volunteered a home. Production wizards got wind of the project and offered their help in recording it. The likes of Jeff Zucker, Holly Schiffer, Peter Rosenfeld, Darin Moran, Jean Martin, Andy Blumenthal, and Nick Phoenix rearranged schedules to participate. Holly Schiffer was able to get three High Definition cameras (Panasonic HVX250's), and an AVID editing facility. When Jeff Zucker went to pick up the camera package, Ted Schilowitz happened to be there and offered a RED camera set up on a Steadi Cam."


... yeah right ;-) Gotta hand it to the republicans- they have got a head-start at camouflaging their campaign efforts - FOX news and the brainwash crowd would be fools not to pick up on that theme.

*edit*

OH, look: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HAzvVtwsW_8&feature=related, and of course: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSWt7hOYYLY&feature=related

I find commercial media political analysis to be pretty stupid in general. They often get hung up on petty details, missing the important points, or perhaps not allowed to speak of important points for fear of scaring off corporate investors. I don't waste my time with either Olbermann (though I don't think he should have been booted off his network) or O'Reilly, although Maddow is pretty good. PBS, NPR and print media offer much deeper, more intellectual coverage, probably because they worry less about pleasing advertisers and can focus on doing their job.

The center is all very relative in our politics. Right of center Democrats who support common sense programs like health care are considered extremists; in the rest of the world, healthcare is a bipartisan issue. The American 'center' lies between right of center moderate dems, and batshit loonies like Sarah Palin on the right. It's not really a middle at all, it's more of a mean; a mean that shifts further and further to the right.

I challenge you to find a genuine liberal extremist who holds any political sway.

Anyway, I agree with Maher that being centrist for the sake of being centrist is a fools errand. It doesn't make you wise, intelligent or in any way independent. When you look at the agenda of the American right, it's easy to see that it is all based around sucking up to corporations. Cap and trade, corporate tax cuts, limiting social services, climate science "skepticism".... They offer nothing helpful to the average Joe. Once you cast a vote for corporatism, you lose the right to call yourself independent.

Anyway, the laptop is almost out of juice, so I'm going to cut this short...



In reply to this comment by hPOD:
It's hard to take an obviously biased [and somewhat insane] Bill Maher seriously. Maher hasn't been watchable for about 4 years now, and he's getting worse and worse. I understand the point you're trying to make, but as a person who truly stands in the middle, I see the extremes in both sides all the time, and that includes Olbermann. Unlike most, I actually DO watch Olbermann AND O'Riley. Well, not Olbermann anymore, but you get the point. I know you want to believe that everything Olbermann touches on is fact based, and everything O'Riley opines on is propaganda based, but that's not reality. There are times both make solid points, and there are times you can tell their <insert right/left> leaning opinions shine on their biased tendencies.

My voting record stands by the fact I call things as I see them, down the middle. In the last 5 Presidential elections, I've voted for 2 Republicans, 2 Democrats and 1 Independent.

A lot of people love to say they're down the middle, and they can see/hear both sides, but their slanted voting records show otherwise. I don't vote for parties, I vote for candidates, whether those votes end up being mistakes in the long run there is little I can do about, but the fact is, I'm one of the very few that actually does ride the fence. Quite a few of my friends, for example, claim the same...but their voting records show pure republican or pure democratic bias.

Maher has let his anti-religious lunacy get the better of him, and this is coming from an avid Hitchen's fan, who is also anti-religious. Hitchen's said it best when he mocked Maher's crowd for believing anything he says and laughing at any Bush joke he used. If I cared enough, going back to the beginning of the United States, I'd venture to say that I could find good things and bad things every single President has done, including Bush Jr and Obama.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
0:50 is relevant to our conversation:

http://videosift.com/video/Bill-Maher-Critiques-Stewart-Colbert-Rally

It's hard to take an obviously biased [and somewhat insane] Bill Maher seriously. Maher hasn't been watchable for about 4 years now, and he's getting worse and worse. I understand the point you're trying to make, but as a person who truly stands in the middle, I see the extremes in both sides all the time, and that includes Olbermann. Unlike most, I actually DO watch Olbermann AND O'Riley. Well, not Olbermann anymore, but you get the point. I know you want to believe that everything Olbermann touches on is fact based, and everything O'Riley opines on is propaganda based, but that's not reality. There are times both make solid points, and there are times you can tell their <insert right/left> leaning opinions shine on their biased tendencies.

My voting record stands by the fact I call things as I see them, down the middle. In the last 5 Presidential elections, I've voted for 2 Republicans, 2 Democrats and 1 Independent.

A lot of people love to say they're down the middle, and they can see/hear both sides, but their slanted voting records show otherwise. I don't vote for parties, I vote for candidates, whether those votes end up being mistakes in the long run there is little I can do about, but the fact is, I'm one of the very few that actually does ride the fence. Quite a few of my friends, for example, claim the same...but their voting records show pure republican or pure democratic bias.

Maher has let his anti-religious lunacy get the better of him, and this is coming from an avid Hitchen's fan, who is also anti-religious. Hitchen's said it best when he mocked Maher's crowd for believing anything he says and laughing at any Bush joke he used. If I cared enough, going back to the beginning of the United States, I'd venture to say that I could find good things and bad things every single President has done, including Bush Jr and Obama.

In reply to this comment by dystopianfuturetoday:
0:50 is relevant to our conversation:

http://videosift.com/video/Bill-Maher-Critiques-Stewart-Colbert-Rally

I thought myself as a child, a fairly regular watcher of the picard star treks. But not one of these scenes rang a bell. Guess I wasn't such an avid watcher after all.

>> ^agopo:

And as an avid hater of pigeons, I am proud of kitty, too!


So you hate http://pigeon.videosift.com/ ?

And as an avid hater of pigeons, I am proud of kitty, too!

my favorite part was 0:56 where he screwed up / got overwhelmed, unless that's just how Jazz works, i'm not an avid listener.

but anyway, it reaffirmed to me that he's actually human and not just some Japanese-made Funk-bot. That was incredible.

>> ^spoco2:

So.. yeah... That's why I don't like the iPad. For what it's MARKETED as, it's shit.
For all the other things you could use it for over and above that... it's nice tech



Ahhh, so the truth comes out then. It's what it has been marketed for that bugs you and a lot of other people.

My only question about that is, Why Do You Give One Shit?

I mean, marketing is the very last thing I ever pay attention to in anything that I purchase. Hell, the entire hacker manifesto is based on using things the way you want, to achieve something other than its intended purpose. Marketing is the darkest form of evil, in my book. (Cue Bill Hicks rant about marketers). But then again, I don't have cable television, so I never see any advertisements anyway, and even when they're online, I just don't watch them.


I'll quickly debate your points:

1- Emailing/Typing - Yes, it's a bit awkward at first, but then again I learned the weird graffiti language for PalmOS back in the day, and we all learned T9. Putting this thing on my lap at an airport isn't the best experience ever, but it beats the hell out of using my phone, or having to lug a laptop around everywhere.

2- Movies - Again, it's not as awesome as my 52" 1080p at home. But it's not supposed to be. It's a smaller screen, and maybe not your ideal aspect ratio, but again, in bed or on the train it's a hell of a lot better than a laptop.

3- Photos - Yep. It's awesome, and I'm an avid photographer. Thing looks stunning.

4- Books - Again with the traveling thing. Being able to carry 100 books on a plane is fantastic. Doesn't beat an actual printed book, but it's a fanastic in-between.

5- Web - You and I can argue about Flash all day (I used to use Flash to build websites too, even worked on one of the very first Flash cartoons ever, through Macromedia/Spumco) Sometimes it's a bummer you can't watch a video, but I just change my browsing habits. I don't really miss Flash at all. Again, this is while traveling, or sitting in my garden, where I just read some blogs and visit videosift, respond to some emails, etc.

But, these are all complaints you have with the way Jobs likes to run his marketing. Me, I just don't pay any attention, and figure out how these bloody things can be integrated into my life. Again, I don't care one shit if the thing has an Apple logo, a Dell logo, or a freakin' McDonald's logo. Just give me the technology and I'll use it the way I want.


btw: This is all coming from a jailbroken T-Mobile iPhone PineApple user.

I was an avid Airwolf fan, but only watched this show a few times. If I remember right, there was one episode where he had to flip a bitch and rather than slow down and do a U-turn, the motorcycle's back shocks detached, pointed downward, fired, blew the bike in the air and 180 degrees, just for it to land with him going the opposite direction.



That or maybe it was a dream I was having...can't remember.

Japanese anime is RARLY (Rawly?) off the wall and strange. I can't really remember any in rescent memory (im an avid fansub watcher). It's their TV showes that are wacked out bonkers!

I gotta say, I have a real love/hate relationship with the way liberals refuse to unify.

Psychologic is right. Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson deserve the credit for what became the final demise of the public option. They're the ones who committed to joining a Republican filibuster of the Senate bill until it was stripped.

It's true that if there had been even one Republican who came out in favor of it, it would've been passed (probably only 61-39, but it'd pass), but that's a fantasy universe where good policy ideas on the left attract votes from the Republican side of the aisle.

I'm not sure that Obama being more engaged about the public option would've gotten it through. Maybe if we had some way of making Obama angry, and getting him to turn into The Rock Obama, he could have played hardball with Democrats, and threatened them with primary challengers, stripping them of chairmanships, etc. Ultimately though, I'm not convinced he really had any stick to wield against either Nelson or Lieberman. There's no other Democrat who could hold onto a Senate seat in Nebraska other than Nelson, and Lieberman seems to have simply been looking for an excuse to join the Republican party ever since the netroots successfully helped Ned Lamont beat him in the Democratic primary in 2006.

I'm honestly not sure there are 51 votes for it in the Senate. That campaign to get signatories to a letter for passing the public option under reconciliation petered out around 40 or so Democrats, and that was counting a lot of people who didn't actually sign the letter, just people who made approving noises about the idea. That makes me think that whether or not there are 51 Democrats who wanted the public option, there weren't 51 willing to try to use reconciliation to pass it.

It's my opinion, as a really, really avid follower of all this, that we just didn't have the votes for the public option.

I'm shocked and pissed about that, and I definitely think the nearly 20 Dems who were only for the public option when it was subject to the filibuster need to be ran through the wringer, but we go into these things with the Democrats we have, not the ones we wish we had. I'm all for a Congress entirely composed of Graysons, Weiners, Sherrod Browns, with a couple Sanders and Kuciniches, but we're a long way from that now.

I think this bill was the best deal we could have gotten in the 111th Congress.

It does not implement any level of government price setting (i.e. its 0% socialist). However, it does collect taxes from the rich, and uses the money to buy insurance for the poor.

It puts lots of new restrictions on insurance companies to make sure their profits come from serving their customers well, not from denying them care. Same for doctors and hospitals, it will make an attempt to change their incentives towards being based on patient outcomes, and not number & size of procedures done.

It does not, and will not solve every health care problem in the country, but it's going to vastly improve the state of our health care system, and provide care to a huge number of people who didn't have access to it, or who couldn't afford it until now.

It's not perfect, but it's definitely a step in the right direction.

I think the main effect this bill will have is that we'll keep reforming our health care system as we go. The public option isn't dead, it just didn't get baked in from the start. We can keep pushing for it, and working to elect people who will fight for it, and working to defeat people who helped kill it...like Joe Lieberman.

I was an avid gamer for over a decade. I quit WoW, and then quit gaming completely... does that count?

Anyway, I'm not overly concerned with the health effects of small amounts of second-hand smoke, but I still can't stand to be around it. That odor lingers in rooms and on clothing like nothing else. It's incredibly irritating.

I do not agree with laws preventing any business from allowing smoking though. If a place wants to be 100% smoking allowed then fine... I won't go there, but it should be their choice.

>> ^rottenseed:
Have you ever done salvia? As a, once avid, consumer of drugs I'd have to say that Salvia is one of the strongest highs I have ever experienced. Like it rips your consciousness away from your ego with ease. You don't get any adjustment time...you're just separated from what you thought you knew about the universe. She doesn't do anything wrong. She just got fucked up. That's what happens to everybody that takes it (assuming its 10X or stronger). It's one of those drugs you don't want to do often and every time one of my friends or myself have done that drug, it has put us in a place beyond our control, no matter our experience level. It is the great equalizer.>> ^westy:
Morons
, looks like she probably has not done it much before.
its people like this that get drugs band , the same people that go out and get uterly waisted on drink, the only difrence is that the government or big companies will never make a huge amount of money out of salvea so it will get band off the bat.
she will end up blaming the drug rather than the fact she didn't bother researching what it dose ,, how much to take and what to expect.



I cannot agree more with what the seedy one said.

It gave me my most wild, vivid psychedelic experience I've ever had (thankfully, it was the most short-lived in realtime, although my conception of time was dramatically altered - those 5 minutes felt like an eternity). It's also given me the weakest (just a lightheaded feeling). It can be inconsistent, even 10x potency. Diviner's Sage can show you some pretty wild things... but only if it wants to.

I'm not going to watch or upvote, because honestly, video cameras should be consciously left out of the psychedelic experience. How they thought this would be a good idea is beyond me. I hope that this haunts them for the rest of their lives in job interviews.

Have you ever done salvia? As a, once avid, consumer of drugs I'd have to say that Salvia is one of the strongest highs I have ever experienced. Like it rips your consciousness away from your ego with ease. You don't get any adjustment time...you're just separated from what you thought you knew about the universe. She doesn't do anything wrong. She just got fucked up. That's what happens to everybody that takes it (assuming its 10X or stronger). It's one of those drugs you don't want to do often and every time one of my friends or myself have done that drug, it has put us in a place beyond our control, no matter our experience level. It is the great equalizer.>> ^westy:
Morons
, looks like she probably has not done it much before.
its people like this that get drugs band , the same people that go out and get uterly waisted on drink, the only difrence is that the government or big companies will never make a huge amount of money out of salvea so it will get band off the bat.
she will end up blaming the drug rather than the fact she didn't bother researching what it dose ,, how much to take and what to expect.