Random acts of typing
Friday, July 19, 2002
Oh no, the market's dropping! End of the world!
Hardly--while certainly it can have a huge affect on people's lives, especially those nearing retirement, there's more to the US economy than just the market. Especially when most of these huge drops in the market are due to a few overpriced and overinflated industries, and corporate cheating [which I don't see how the President affects anyway]. All the focus on the market--which is meant to be a long term measure of a business's success, not the get-rich-quick dot-com scams of the 90's--is taking away from other positive news like this. There's more to the success of our economy than just the market. My company is a huge one, and while our stock offering is not doing well, our sales, revenue, ebit, etc, has all been steadily increasing over the past couple years.
Goddammit...the worst of both worlds: tired as hell and wide-ass awake. And I can't even say I'll be on time for work, because I have two stops to go to first.
Thursday, July 18, 2002
http://www.cnn.com/2002/SHOWBIZ/TV/07/18/abc.bachelorette.ap/index.html
Let it DIE already! Damn! Is there a part of somebody's life we haven't yet stuck a camera in? Do audiences truly have nothing better in their lives than to watch this dreck? Oh, and of course, she says "I hope to find an ambitious and confident man who has a great sense of humor and is a strong conversationalist,"...Right...As long as they pass the producer's first tests of being camerafriendly, with enough angst to pique people's interest, but not too different so as to piss them off.
And I found this pairing of headlines ironic:
• ABC playing matchmaker again with 'Bachelorette'
• Angelina Jolie: My marriage is on the rocks
Well, hell, why not, can we get a camera in there? What's next, 'Fight Over the Kids?' I know we had Divorce Court, but all that really did was stick a camera in a courtroom, which was usually public access anyway.
What makes me laugh is how all the media press [you know, the ones who focus on 'infotainment,' pushing crap to the masses who can tell you each of the 'Friends' relationships, but couldn't tell you who Condi Rice is] put these things in headlines like it's 'New!' and Fresh!' It's a fad that has about run its course. But no, that's not how Hollywood does it, we got one hit, let's overdose on it, then dump it in a month blaming the host or the contestants or, hell, the cameraman. I mean, I liked 'Who Wants to Be a Millionaire,', but damn, there's only one show I'd watch five nights a week, and it sure ain't a gameshow where the general theme and play is the same every night. [fyi: the Simpsons, but also because there are over 10 full seasons of shows to pull from. Not that they do, the syndicated episodes are always from the last two seasons, which does get old.]
Wednesday, July 17, 2002
Like we needed any more reason to think politicians are hypocritical. I don't smoke cigarettes, and never have, except for the typical 'only when drinking' college habit. [I do smoke a pipe occassionally, though, and you haven't seen anti-smoking until you try smoking a pipe. Let's see, mine is a nice aromatic cherry, yours is a nasty nose clogging pure smoke--but you're allowed to do it almost everywhere, but all the restaurants have a 'Please no pipe or cigar smoking' on their menu.] Anyway--which way do they want it? In half the articles about increasing the cigarette taxes, they say 'Because we need money' [which is a whole 'nother thread--how often do you go to your boss and say 'Give me more money' when you run out?]. And in the other half, they say 'We're trying to make people quit smoking.' And there is a lot of evidence that this financial rape, er, tax increase, has a great effect on that. But, hey, geniuses--if you increase the tax cost, and more people quit, the odds are you will be getting LESS money than you currently are!! Your goals are totally mutually exclusive! Not that that is a surprise in and of itself....I would be mad that we elect morons, but most of the voting public are morons also....
Tuesday, July 16, 2002
Wow.... here's an interesting article, about an entertainer who not only likes America, but was motivated by the 9-11 attacks to become a citizen. Too bad it's buried in the middle of a local paper's website. If he had mouthed off about the country, like the typical Hollywood 'rebels', he'd be front page material.
Well, this American says Thanks, and welcome, Pete.
Is it just me, or is ">eBay going to heck in a handbasket? You used to be able to find some really good deals, because it was private parties, trying to get rid of stuff they no longer wanted or needed. Andwhen you had to pay some bucks, it was because the item was collectible--limited edition, autographed, prototype, rare, whathaveyou. Now, however, at least what the stuff I search for, is mostly populated by businesses making thousands of dollars and thousands of sales daily. I am not against making a profit, that's what keeps the paychecks flowing, and I'm not against businesses or corporations by any means, but the one time either my wife or myself had a bad transaction, it was from one of those 'powersellers' who constantly has hundreds of auctions going at the time, and one negative feedback doesn't outweight the 18000 positive. Mistakes happen, sure, but I would especially expect one of those large businesses to make a point of fixing their mistakes [of course, purposefully sending a misrepresented item and then saying Tough really isn't a mistake, now, is it?]
Anyway--so these people post these things as a way to avoid whatever local business rules they would have to comply with [taxes, overhead, whatever.] End result--eBay, no longer an auctionhouse, is a storefront. Case in point: Searching for ">Lexx DVD's. Probably 90% of them are some business unloading a bunch of stuff, and asking a price that can easily be beat by exploring DVD Price Search. And most of them don't sell. I haven't sold on eBay in a while, but I think there's still a [very reasonable] charge even for listing items that don't sell. Of course, the big sellers, or at least big listers, get preferred rates. And yes, you could say don't buy from them. I don't. If I am going to spend that much on an item, I'll buy it from Best Buy or one of the big websites [Deep Discount, Amazon, whatever] and deal directly with them rather than jacking around with eBay.
Of course, as bad as that is, even worse is when you start looking for anime. One of the big titles is Cowboy Bebop, an entertaining sci-fi bounty hunter episodic series. Great series, excellent music. Even the English dub isn't bad, which is rare. Searching for "Cowboy Bebop DVD" in titles and descriptions gets you 299 hits. However, edit out "-vcd" since they, well, suck compared to DVD's, gets you 265. Now, edit out the word '-chinese': 66. Editing out the word Chinese, because some scumbags sell bootleg pirate copies from Hong Kong or somewhere, that are poor quality, poor subs/dubs, only 3 disks instead of 6, in some crappy fold out case, and the big signal, have Chinese subtitles. 66 out of the original 299. Even postulating that, oh, say, 10 percent of those that were edited out had text like 'This is not some crappy Chinese bootleg, but the official version' as I have indeed seen, that still gives us almost 70% of the original listings that are illegal, pirated, bootleg, poor quality copies, that some scumbag pirate is making money off of. Even though eBay makes you read the fine print and check all the boxes, they don't crack down on this stuff. Why not? Well, some may say that it's because there's so much of it--seems to me that would make it like shooting fish in a barrel [silly saying, that]. Of course, notice again how many of those there are, and the average starting price is about 23.99--listing fees on hundreds of 23.99's add up to profits for eBay. [And then they charge 10.00 for shipping from Hong Kong! I mean, come on, anyone who buys into this crap is as stupid as the pirates are! The only way we're going to keep getting good, quality anime over here in a reasonable format is to BUY it from the RIGHT PEOPLE! I got Session 1 for 24.99 from Best Buy, and didn't regret it a second.]
What gets me about the pirate thing is this: certainly piracy is wrong, not even going to argue that. But I can believe in the concept of an 'honest thief', kinda like an 'honest politician', you know, one who gets bought and stays bought. What gets me is the hypocrisy: Hi, I'm a pirate. I steal people's music and DVD's and videotapes. AND THEN I turn around and sell them. If there were a god, or if there were any justice, these bastards would be ripped off for all they own also. Basically that's like saying I can make a profit, but you can't. [kinda like the IRS, in a way.]. An 'honest thief', in this case, would be one who pirates it and keeps it, or releases it for free. Certainly that's also wrong, but at least there is some sort of principle, misguided as it may be. Whereas that previous person, the Hong Kong, is just the lowest of the low, total scumbag.
The dangers of wheeling and mealing Hagerty found that it’s not so much the eating as the spilling, smearing and dropping that cause traffic accidents. The moral: “If it can drip, don’t eat it while you drive.”
If I may: DUH. It is a truly sad state of affairs that there even has to be a study about this. The most dangerous foods to eat while driving, according to sthe study? "chocolate (“drivers instinctively try to clean the smears and stains immediately”), soft drinks (too easily tip), jelly- and cream-filled doughnuts (they ooze), fried chicken (greasy hands), barbecue (just messy), juicy hamburgers (dripping condiments), chili (including chili dogs, sloppy Joes, etc.), tacos, hot soups, and — the most hazardous item — coffee."
Is there any one of those that any person--well, any thinking person--could not recognize to be potentially distracting if eaten while driving? What's next, watermelon? Ice cream cone? Shishkebab? Are we in that much of a hurry that we have to eat these meals in the car? Hot soups? Come ON, people, are you all dumbasses? Wait--don't answer that...
Now, I do sometimes eat while driving. However: I leave the restaurant or the drive through, and park in a space whilst I get situated. Spread out napkins, drink a little of the beverage so it's not so full. And what I eat is just about one of the easiest car foods to eat--chicken nuggets and fries. That's it. Dump 'em in the bad, stick your hand in. Takes less attention than changing the radio station. And I only eat on steady straightaways, not curvy-ass high traffic areas.
Interesting side note: the article I read before this one was about some electronic voting machines being tested in Florida, because of the idiocy expressed in the 2000 election. Paraphrase from a citizen there: 'I was one of the idiots who didn't vote right.' Are we turning into a nation of morons? That same article mentioned 'overvoting' and 'undervoting', resulting in tossed ballots. Overvoting--well, duh. Vote for one, if you mess up, ask for another ballot. I'm pretty sure they'll give you one. Undervoting--see, there's another word for that, which doesn't result in the ballot getting tossed--it's called Abstaining. There's usually at least one race per ballot I abstain from; either there's only one candidate, or I don't know anything about the position/candidates. Wait, that means I get to redo all my votes! I'll take it to court! It's not fair! *whinewhinewhine*
Sigh--open suggestion to most of society: Grow up; Use your brain; Deal with it.
Wait a minute--I thought soft money was evil? At least that's what all the anti-free-speech activists have been harping about. 'Campaign Finance Reform'. 'No Soft Money.' Except, of course, for me, says Sen John Edwards-- "Sen. John Edwards put up the biggest numbers, with his Senate campaign committee and his political action committee bringing in $2.6 million in the last three months. NEARLY $1.9 MILLION of the donations to Edwards’ political action committee (PAC) were in the form of “soft money” — large, unlimited donations given by corporations, unions and individuals." This, in spite of the fact that, as according to Congressional scholar David Mason,
"*Most soft-money activities already have been approved by the Supreme Court as exercises of First Amendment rights.
*While Congress has some authority to regulate national political parties, even those regulations must be focused narrowly on preventing fraud or corruption.
*Regulation of the soft-money activities of non-party groups and individuals is both subject to the strictest constitutional scrutiny and nearly always constitutionally invalid. Regulating advertising because it includes the name or likeness of a public official, for example, is clearly unconstitutional".
And another interesting quote from that same source:
"is the declaration by House Minority Leader Richard Gephardt (D-MO) that "What we have is two important values in conflict: freedom of speech and our desire for healthy campaigns in a healthy democracy. You can't have both."5 The truth, however, is that these values are not in conflict: The First Amendment's guarantee of freedom of speech was designed to ensure a healthy democracy. One cannot exist without the other. "
What he really meant was, "If there's money floating around, we want it on our side. And since it'll be illegal after the elections, lets suck up all we can right now so we can look like we are doing the right thing while still benefiting from the millions of dollars." Hypocrites, all of 'em.
Monday, July 15, 2002
Ok...this is interesting...Ohio Democratic Representative James Traficant, recently convicted by a federal court of criminal charges, wants to plead his case to the House to stay in the House. [Seems to me if you're convicted, you should get kicked out, but what do I know.]
Anyway--the interesting thing is this: he wants to stay in, and is seeking re-election. He's been a Democrat since 1984, according to his official bio; however, all of a sudden, he is "seeking re-election as an independent". Wow, what a coincidence...I can only imagine the smoky rooms that Gephart and Daschle and who knows who else are involved with: "Okay, Jim, we don't care what you did, you just got busted. Don't drag us down with you. Can you turn Republican? Or will that be too obvious? No, just go 'independent' this time. Next time you do something bad, you have to become a Republican, but right now we're hammering on the stock/corporate scandal thing, even though it started when our boy Billy was Prez, and there is at least as much evidence linking us to these games as there is the Repubs...But since when do we let facts affect us?"
