Category: Random Ramblings

Anything that catches my fancy as a topic I want to cover. Truly random crap.

My take on the attorney firings

Since I’ve just been critical of the Bush administration on a number of things, and ended by pointing out the handling of the attorney firings fiasco, I figured I needed to put something up about my take on the firings. I’ll start by saying I don’t care that the firings took place – that is the President’s right and the attorneys’ risk. I don’t care that we, as Americans, were told that these attorneys were fired for job related issues, even though that claim has been shown highly improbable and inaccurate. I am surprised that this issue has garnered so much attention, but I don’t feel the attention is unwarranted.

I do care that the President has the right to replace the attorneys for an indefinite time without Congressional review. Thankfully, that right is being reviewed and presumably removed. And I do care that this affair has shown us that our top law man, Attorney General Gonzales, seems not to be trustworthy nor heavily in favor of actually protecting the rule of law as much as advancing political plans. I understand that this happens all the time, but I want the Attorney General to at least appear to be strongly motivated to protect the law over protecting the party. That may be unrealistic, but at least some attempt to favor law over party politics is necessary for my continued support.

When Gonzales was first up for appointment, I listened to the review sessions. I read up some on his background. I tried to stay informed of topics discussed in Congress and Gonzales views on rulings of the law. I saw some minor things that I wasn’t in favor of (for instance, Gonzales is not a proponent of personal rights – a pet protection of mine), but overall he looked like a good candidate. I had no real complaints when he was approved and assigned US Attorney General. Since then, however, he has given a bizarre interpretation of the Constitution in at least one instance I know, and now looks to be less trustworthy and more politically motivated than law and Constitutionally motivated. It’s an unavoidable reality that people’s personal biases will come out in such situations, but I’m concerned Gonzales may be letting too much personal viewpoint into his work. It’s hard to explain, so I’ll not get too deep into that. I just am expressing a growing personal unease with Gonzales and the job he has done since passing Congressional review.

I’m not ready to call for his resignation as many, liberal and conservative (and, unsurprisingly, another liberal), in Congress are. But I am keeping a careful eye on his performance and his work so I can better re-evaluate him (not that my view will have meaning to anyone but me).

[tags]My opinion on Gonzales and the attorney firings of last year[/tags]

Apple goes “Duh!” – gives users useful discount

Really, this is the kind of thing that is so obvious it seems some digital music provider would have already done this. I’ve complained about the lack of this feature before, and skipped purchasing online music in some cases because I didn’t see a store offer it. What the hell am I babbling about now? Why, Apple’s new complete my album purchasing option, naturally.

Apple(r) today announced Complete My Album(r), a groundbreaking new iTunes service that allows customers to turn their individual tracks into a complete album at a reduced price by giving them a full 99 cent credit for every track they have previously purchased from that album.

“Music fans can now round out their music collections by upgrading their singles into complete albums with just one click, and get full credit for those songs they have previously purchased from iTunes,” said Eddy Cue, Apple’s vice president of iTunes. “Complete My Album is a wonderful new way that iTunes helps customers grow and enjoy their music collections.”

. . .

Complete My Album offers customers up to 180 days after first purchasing individual songs from any qualifying album to purchase the rest of that album at a reduced price. When users buy any song on iTunes the corresponding album will immediately appear on their personalized Complete My Album page with the reduced price listed. For example, a user who’s already purchased three 99 cent singles and decides to buy the corresponding $9.99 album would be able to download the remaining songs to complete the album for just $7.02, without having to buy the singles again.

See? It’s a “Duh!” feature for people who like to legally acquire music for our portable media devices. (via CrunchGear)

[tags]Apple offering new “complete my album” purchase option online[/tags]

And it’s large enough to hold a lifetime supply!

condom-dispenser.jpg Well, at least for married men. What you are looking at there is the condom dispenser, available for purchase from Canoe Online. Dimensions aren’t given on the page, but looking at the height vs. width vs. depth, I’m guessing it will hold either 6 (half a box) or 12 (full box). In either case, all you married men can get one, load it up with a lifetime supply of your favorite condoms, and never again have to worry about where the rubbers are when that special day comes around once every few years. (via CrunchGear)


[tags]Condom dispenser holds lifetime supply for married men, Keep your condoms looking good while you aren’t using them[/tags]

Better child care = better vocabulary, but more child care = more behavior problems

In a recently released study, researchers say children who receive better childcare have better vocabularies, but are more likely to show behavioral problems in later elementary years as their time in childcare increases.

The findings come from the largest study of child care and development conducted in the United States. The 1,364 children in the analysis had been tracked since birth as part of a study by the National Institutes of Health.

In the study’s latest installment, being released Monday, researchers evaluated whether characteristics observed between kindergarten and third grade were still present in fifth grade or sixth grade. The researchers found that the vocabulary and behavior patterns did continue, though many other characteristics did dissipate.

The researchers said the increase in vocabulary and problem behaviors was small, and that parenting quality was a much more important predictor of child development.

Just something to think about if you shuffle your kids off to childcare every chance you get and pass on spending more time with them when you have the chance to. I’m certainly feeling more guilty than I used to about the amount of time my children spend in daycare.

On the other hand, it looks like the folks over at Slate smelled a rat on this. So Emily Bazelon at Slate contacted the study’s author, Margaret Burchinal, who wanted to explain what was not being reported properly about the study. Turns out the study wasn’t quite being reported properly in the news, or hadn’t fully expressed the negative findings as intended.

“I’m not sure we communicated this, but the kids who had one to two years of daycare by age 4½-which was typical for our sample-had exactly the level of problem behavior you’d expect for kids of their age. Most people use center care for one or two years, and for those kids we’re not seeing anything problematic.”

Could it be that most media outlets are over-reporting the negative aspects of childcare? It seems that perhaps the potential downsides of childcare make for a more sensationalistic report than the upsides or the importance of genetics and parenting. I’ll have to say, this certainly bears some small resemblance to my often repeated claim that mass media is biased towards sensationalism more than any particular political bias (which generally is expressed as the liberal media bias). I’m starting the think that maybe my evaluation of mass media providers is a better descriptor than the view held by those convinced of the liberal bias of the media. Of course, I’m used to believing myself more than anyone else. Yes, there is often a liberal bias, but I think more often the bias is sensationalism over all other things.

[tags]Better vocabulary from better childcare but more behavioral problems from more childcare?, How childcare quality and time correlates to vocabulary and behavioral states[/tags]

In goes bread, out comes toast – magic!

This toaster_clip.jpg is recent, but not totally new news. It does not appear these are actually in production and available anywhere, but whenever these awesome ceramic toasters go up for sale, I want to buy one. Hopefully they can be made at an affordable price point.

designer’s own words:
There has been little development of the toaster since the start of the century, whilst other appliances have developed and improved incorporating new technologies and thinking, toaster have remained relatively untouched. When the toaster was first invented eating toast was a social activity that took place on the breakfast table, these days toasters have been relegated to cheap plastic objects hidden away in the kitchen landscape. This toaster is designed to engage the user, re-invigorating the social context of toasting by questioning everything about what we toast with today. I was also keen to make playful object to be proud of having on your breakfast table. Slip moulded bone china allowed me create this intricate and sculptural form, but also provided the material longevity that I required. This is a toaster that brings life and joy to a stagnant domestic appliance, and iconic object for the home.


[tags]Ceramic toaster, Toaster magic[/tags]

High class service? Goes down hard

When the headline says High-class hooker service goes down hard, you just have to see what the story is. And when the article ends with

“They didn’t provide us with any hands-on training or even an instruction manual, so at least in the beginning, the blow jobs we dispensed really sucked — in the negative sense of the term,” she complained.

you just have to laugh at the whole story. The real story is a high-cost prostitution service drew too much police attention, got less selective about the call-girls hired, didn’t provide training, and eventually got shut down because of lack of quality service and police pressure. But it’s way funnier to just read the headline, read the last paragraph, and fill in the rest yourself.

[tags]High-class hooker service goes down hard[/tags]

A possible restoration of rights and protections for Americans?

Finally we see a few members of Congress are growing the spines we need them to have to take back our rights and freedoms that have been slowly stripped away by President Bush, his lackies, and the until-recently roll-over-and-give-him-everything Congress. We have Senators questioning and harshly criticizing FBI Director Robert Mueller for the abuses of the PATRIOT act that have recently come to light. Members of the House Judiciary Committee look to be working to curtail the FBI’s record-gathering powers if these abuses aren’t fixed. Congress-critters, aware that since Karl Rove can’t even tell the truth under oath (premium content – I can post some of the information if requested, but it should be viewable via temporary pass), he and others in the Bush enclave shouldn’t be trusted to give believable statements in non-transcribed, non-recorded, non-mass media provided, not under oath questioning.

That means that subpoenas are authorized for certain White House advistors to require testifying under oath on the recent firing of several US attorneys general last year. It appears that the Congress-critters aren’t willing to accept Tony Snow’s “Executive Privilege is bad for Clinton and good for Bush” flip-flopping now. So maybe, just maybe, we’ll start to see our rights actually protected by our government rather than secretly stripped away via classified executive orders and Presidential signing statements which lack any legal force. Only time will tell.

Of course, I don’t expect this will lead to impeaching the man who is so committed to violating our rights, but I can always hope for that positive outcome.

[tags]Some in Congress may be growing enough spine to protect America from Presidential abuse[/tags]