Category: News

Bumper Stickers, Magnet Ribbons & Rubber Bracelets

News

I haven’t taken my Kerry/Edwards sticker off my bumper yet. I don’t know why. Maybe my period of mourning hasn’t passed yet. Or maybe I want to cling to it as my own “I told you so” for when Bush’s continued incompetence finally catches up to him, although his re-election leaves me little hope that it ever will.

Other cars sport magnetic yellow or flag colored ribbons reminding us to “Support Our Troops” and that “United We Stand”. I guess we’ve run short of ‘old oak trees’. I support our troops. But I do not support their Commander-in-Chief. Is he supporting our troops?

Now Lance Armstrong’s rubber yellow braclets have led a new wave of wearable advocacy. It’s not new really, I can remember the metal bracelet my father used to wear in remembrance of a POW/MIA soldier in Vietnam. And some have jumped on this bandwagon by offering blue or black bracelets to tell the world you’re no Bush supporter. I don’t know if I’ll get one, I might. Anyone who knows me doesn’t need to see a bracelet to know my politics.

Just be careful what color your put on your wrist, as there may be untended consequences, especially in a hospital.

update: too funny… tonight on my commute home I saw a truck with 7 various ribbon magnets, two American flags, and two racing number 3’s for Dale Earnhardt 🙂

For further reading:

Anti-Bush Bracelets Say, ‘Count Me Blue’
AP, 1/15/05

Heart on a wrist
San Francisco Chronicle, 1/14/05, editorial

Proliferating bracelets could pose hazards for patients
American Medical News, 1/3/05

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End the Year by Helping People in Need

News

Last year, as the last hours of 2003 ticked away, I was moved to make a financial contribution to a political candidate. It seemed very important at the time, and it was.

Click Here to Pay Learn More

But it just can’t compare to the sort of need you can help with right now. This year has ended with a horrifying tragedy too large to fully comprehend. The current reporting is that 80,000 people have lost their lives in the recent Tsunamis that have struck in the Indian Ocean. The likelihood is that the total number of casualities will continue to rise dramatically, and many thousands who survived the Tsunamis are now at risk of from disease and hunger.

Please consider ending the year by helping your fellow man, and be thankful that it wasn’t you who lost everything. Use these links to either make a contribution using your existing account information at Amazon.com, or directly to the American Red Cross International Response Fund.

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Post-Election Numbers

News, Politics

In Today’s Washington Post, author Scott Turow has a piece about the numbers that let to Bush’s election victory last month that is worth a read:

A Dominant GOP? How So?
The Washington Post, 12/26/2004

In the article, Turow points out that Bush’s popular-vote margin over Kerry is the lowest ever recorded by an incumbent president – just under 2.5%, and on this point he writes:

This shouldn’t underrate Bush’s achievements. He improved on his 2000 performance, winning a slight majority this year – a little less than 51 percent. And it is probably a tribute to his political skills that he won at all because sitting presidents tend to win decisively, or lose. But by the yard stick of history, the Bush victory cannot be taken as a resounding chorus of support from the American people asking for more of the same.

If Bush won (and in America today you don’t have to be a raving nutjob to accept the fact that THIS President would go to any lengths to win legitimately or not), then Democrats will have to accept that. What we must not accept is the Republican attempt to spin this razor-thin victory into some a mandate by a predominantly Red America that just plain doesn’t exist.

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Fighting Back Against Spam

News, Technology

Last November, Lycos Europe launched a web service called ‘Make Love, Not Spam‘ which allowed visitors to download a unique screen saver. The goal was to serve a little payback in unwanted traffic to the web sites promoted in spam email messages. The screen saver happily sent endless requests to these servers, slowing their ability to churn out their unwanted messages. Criticized for using tactics of the sort more often employed by hackers and others who might launch such a denial of service attack, Lycos shut down the service.

I’m glad to see that creative efforts to fight back aggressively agains spam are being explored and implemented. Even if this particular approach has crossed the line somewhere (where was the ‘Make Love’ part of this, on the screen saver?), I applaud Lyco Europe for trying to do something, and hope they’ll keep at it. Fighting spammers in court, as was successfully done recently in Virginia, is great, but it’s only one weapon in the fight against spam. And global fight that it is, won’t always be an available option.

The real problem will never be solved. Spam only works because people are stupid, and it only takes a few boneheads who think that cheap VIAKAGARA is only a click away to force those of us who know better to pay the price for their ignorance in the spam we receive as a result. Idiots.

Anti-spam screensaver scrapped
BBC, 12/6/04

UPDATE: Slashdot reports that a trojan horse virus is being distributed under the false promise that it is the installer of the Lycos Anti-Spam screensaver. Jeesh… you really just can’t win for trying can you.

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Leaving’s Not So Easy

News, Politics

Harper’s Magazine online has a great article titled Electing to Leave that should be of interest to anyone who threated such action in the face of our current electoral outcome. Turns out, it’s not as easy as you might think. Renouncing your U.S. Citizenship and becoming a citizen somewhere else is a process that can take years.

Take heart and remember, the result was 51-48. Blue America is not as small as it may feel at the moment. Instead of fleeing the country, consider instead having an raising some smart kids in a Red state. It’s a slow but solid strategy for breaking the strangle of the ignorant majority.

thanks to Political Wire for the story

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Headlines

News

Find the good news for Bush… I can’t.

from The Northern Virginia Journal – 10/29/84

– Iraqi troops slaughtered

– First Md. flue case confirmed

– FBI probes Halliburton contract

– Feds to triple number of election monitors

– Missouri joins other states importing drugs from Canada

– Scientists estimate 100,000 Iraqis may have died due to war

– IAEA says it warned U.S. about explosives in April

– Watch your account: Checks clear faster

– Exxon Mobil profits surge on oil prices

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