Category: Random Ramblings

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

Keith Olbermann puts another painful smack down on Bill O’Reilly

Before you watch this, you might want to look up something of the Malmédy massacre (good sources at HistoryNet or at Wikipedia). That out of the way, watch this video in which Keith Olbermann again points out how horribly wrong Bill O’Reilly is, even when O’Reilly tries to tell his fans that he didn’t say what he said. The really disgusting thing is Fox News changed the transcript of the broadcast to make it appear that O’Reilly did not say what he clearly said – two times. I think Bill O’Reilly is an even worse mouthpiece than Rush Limbaugh, so seeing someone point out anything he does which is this horribly wrong just makes me happy.

Olbermann: Abraham Lincoln did not shoot John Wilkes Booth. The Titanic did not sink a North Atlantic iceberg. And Fox News is neither fair nor balanced. These are simple historical facts intelligible to all adults, most children, and some of your more discerning domesticated animals. But not, as the third story on the countdown proves yet again, not to Bill O.

I have downloaded this video (thanks to the VideoDownloader extension for FireFox), but at nearly 20 Meg, I cannot afford the bandwidth to post it here for all visitors. If you cannot get to the YouTube to watch the video, give me your email address in the comments section (appropriately obfuscated to avoid harvesting bots if necessary) and I’ll post it somewhere and shoot you a link.

[tags]Keith Olbermann, Bill O’Reilly is wrong again, Fox News is neither fair nor balanced[/tags]

Dumb crook news

(via Engadget)

Today’s dumb crook news, courtesy Carroll County News Online.

BERRYVILLE – Two Berryville men have been charged with theft of property for allegedly stealing $1,200 worth of video games from Wal-Mart and selling them next door at the “Game Stop” store.

Kyle Ramer, 18, and Sam Hess, 21, were allegedly caught on camera removing video games from their cases and stuffing the games down their pants.

. . .

The link to Game Stop was discovered by Wal-Mart’s loss prevention person, Bartos said.

“While he was in Game Stop, he asked if they had any large amounts of video games come in, Bartos explained. “They said yes, and it all matched what had been taken.”

Wow!  Steal from Wal-Mart.  Go next door and sell to Game Stop.  Sheer genius!!!1!VWBUG!!  I’m signing up for whatever class these guys took to learn this.

[tags]Dumb crook news, The value of education in today’s society[/tags]

How it should have ended

I’m sure you’ve thought you could come up with a better ending to a movie sometime.  It turns out that a lot of other folks feel the same way about their skills.  As a result of the work others have done to write up how movies should have ended, we now have The Official How It Should Have Ended web site.  I particularly liked the Star Wars Episode IV rewritten ending, but several of the works on the site are worth checking out.

[tags]How it should have ended, Change the movie ending and show others what you’ve done[/tags]

Get increased control over your Windows windows

DM2 is a cool open source tool that gives you more control over your Windows experience.

DM2 provides several Windows enhancements that may help in every-day work. One of the nicest and most popular features of DM2 is minimizing windows to floating icons® (unique feature!) freeing both task bar and tray bar space. Moreover, DM2 can manipulate windows in various ways: minimize to tray, make them standing always on-top over all other windows, roll to caption, resize, align to screen borders, hide, set the opacity etc. DM2 also helps with Open/Save dialog boxes, by providing user-defined menu with favorites and recent files and folders. Plenty of program’s settings options will satisfy most of requirements.

And that is not all! DM2 also supports custom plugins, which further enhances the program and that usually covers some more specific functionalities. So, from this aspect, one may think of DM2 as a small, but robust manager for all kind of plugins. Find what you need, plug it in, and use it:)

One of the reasons I like this tool is the Virtual Desktop plugin for it.  Get access to extra desktops.  I’m so accustomed to this feature in Linux and Unix that getting it on a Windows system is a nice bonus.

[tags]Improve your Windows experience, DM2[/tags]

Anti-Rootkit tools

In this day and age of malware everywhere, it’s nice to occasionally use tools that look a little deeper at your system to see if something bad is hidden there. From Sophos, you can get the Sophos Anti-Rootkit.  From F-Secure, you can get F-Secure Blacklight.  From SysInternals, you can get Rootkit Revealer.  All of these tools look for certain abnormalities that appear on your system when you have a rootkit.  They won’t catch everything, but they do pick up a lot of stuff not hidden perfectly.  Rootkit revealer is the tool Mark Russinovich was testing when he discovered and publicized the Sony DRM Rootkit.  The Rootkit Revealer download page has good information on how to read the output to tell if you have a rootkit.

While we’re dealing with anti-malware tools, why not head over to Grisoft’s web site and pick up the free version of AVG anti-virus (free for home use, that is)?  And since we’re on that thread, there’s AntiVir PersonalEdition Classic, also free for private individual use.  Or how about Avast Home Edition?  Even if it weren’t already a great AV tool, it would be worth checking out for it’s name – anything pirate sounding deserves recognition.

In fact, there are so many free anti-malware and security tools out there, that you should just start checking more of them out.  You should find something that works for you without being too intrusive.  I recommend starting with Freebyte’s guide to anti-virus and anti-malware tools.

Thanks to Clif at Freewarewiki for pointing out the Sophos tool in the August 27th newsletter.  This lead me to putting out some other recommendations for free anti-rootkit and anti-malware tools.

[tags]Free anti-rootkit tools, Free anti-virus tools, Free anti-malware tools[/tags]

The truth about rectal disorders

You know, this advertisement from the September 1950 issue of Popular Science just doesn’t strike me as the kind of thing that gets a lot of conversations going around the office.

“So Bob, how’s that painful ass problem working out for you?”

“You know Sam, I just ordered this fantastic book which covers all the major rectal disorders. Turns out I have Fistula.”

See? That’s just not your typical watercooler fare. I’m not saying such conversations never happen, but I will say I’m fortunate enough to never participate in the conversations if they are going on.

A FREE BOOK Told Me The Truth About RECTAL DISORDERS

Our 164-page illustrated book describes symptoms, causes and treatment of piles, fistula and other rectal and colonic disorders. It should be read by everyone suffering from these treacherous afflictions. Write for a FREE COPY today.

McCleary Clinic and Hospital, 971 Elms Blvd., Excelsior Springs, Mo.
GET YOUR FREE COPY TODAY

But I bet that Bob does get all the ladies after him. With a hard-luck story like that, who could resist him? Just don’t ask him for too many details.

Now contact Grandma Grinny there and get your guide to all your rectal aches, pains and problems. And it’s free.
[tags]Modern Mechanix, Rectal disorders[/tags]

The honeymoon hat 50 years out, from 50 years back

More greatness from the Modern Mechanix blog.  This is an image from the September 1956 issue of Mechanix Illustrated magazine.  It’s a photo of the predicted honeymoon hat from the year 2056.

HONEYMOON HAT for Moon use in 2056 has dual antennas so newlyweds can call Earth and tell in-laws to stay home.

[tags]Modern Mechanix, Honeymoon hat from 2056, What *IS* that?[/tags]

Making sure children are scientifically illiterate

(via Tingilinde)

This just in – some scientists really dislike the way creationists handle the evolution issue.  I mean, what with the attempts to get evolution removed from science books and the push to get His noodly appendagecreationism-is-science put in science books under the guise of intelligent design, some scientists get rather bothered by the whole fight and the wrongheadedness they feel the creationists show.  Take for example, this writing by Lawrence M. Krauss about the recent school board elections and evolution vs. creationism/intelligent design debate.

Voters in Kansas ensured this month that noncreationist moderates will once again have a majority (6 to 4) on the state school board, keeping new standards inspired by intelligent design from taking effect.

This is a victory for public education and sends a message nationwide about the public’s ability to see through efforts by groups like the Discovery Institute to misrepresent science in the schools. But for those of us who are interested in improving science education, any celebration should be muted.

. . .

But perhaps more worrisome than a political movement against science is plain old ignorance. The people determining the curriculum of our children in many states remain scientifically illiterate. And Kansas is a good case in point.

The chairman of the school board, Dr. Steve Abrams, a veterinarian, is not merely a strict creationist. He has openly stated that he believes that God created the universe 6,500 years ago, although he was quoted in The New York Times this month as saying that his personal faith “doesn’t have anything to do with science.”

“I can separate them,” he continued, adding, “My personal views of Scripture have no room in the science classroom.”

A key concern should not be whether Dr. Abrams’s religious views have a place in the classroom, but rather how someone whose religious views require a denial of essentially all modern scientific knowledge can be chairman of a state school board.

I have recently been criticized by some for strenuously objecting in print to what I believe are scientifically inappropriate attempts by some scientists to discredit the religious faith of others. However, the age of the earth, and the universe, is no more a matter of religious faith than is the question of whether or not the earth is flat.

Read the whole thing to see if you pick up just a bit of the hostility I think is there.  And join the debate – which is right, creationism/intelligent design or evolution?  Or maybe it’s something else, like Pastafarianism.

[tags]Creationism vs. Evolution, Intelligent design hackery?, His noodly appendage, Some scientists dislike creationists[/tags]

Super compact 9V USB charger

(via MAKEzine blog)

I’ve seen a lot of 9V battery based USB chargers.  Most seem built around an Altoids mint container.  This one is far smaller, and doesn’t have room to actually hold the 9V battery.  Basically, you plug the battery in on one side and the USB device which needs charged in the other.  I’ve skipped all the other 9V USB guides, but I may try to put one of these together just for those occasions when I have something which charges or runs off a USB connection.  It even has a cool little LED so you can tell when it’s working.

One of the really cool things about this is the charger itself is built from the shell of a 9V battery.  Instructions and images are given for disassembling one battery to build the charger.  Obviously, then, you need a non-disassembled battery to hook up and provide power for the USB port.

[tags]9V USB charger, YAN9VUSBC (Yet another 9 volt USB charger)[/tags]

More guitar playing madness

If you just haven’t learned enough about playing guitar, then try getting in on this offer, from the February 1968 issue of Popular Mechanics.

PLAY GUITAR IN 7 DAYS OR MONEY BACK

TOP GUITARIST ED SALE’S famous 66 page secret system worth $3.00 teaches you to play a beautiful song the first day and any song by ear or note in seven days. Contains 52 photos, 87 finger placing charts, etc. plus 110 popular and western songs, (words and music); a $1.00 Chord Finder of all the chords used in popular music; and a $3.00 Guitarist Book of Knowledge.

TOTAL VALUE $7.00 —ALL FOR ONLY $2.98

SEND NO MONEY! Just your name and address, pay postman: $2.98 plus CO.D. postage. Or send $3.00 with order and I pay postage. (Sorry, no C.O.D. outside Continental U.S.A.—please remit with order) .
10-Day Money-Back Guarantee.
ED SALE, Studio 154-B, Avon By The Sea, N.J. 07717

[tags]Play guitar, Modern Mechanix[/tags]

On the effectiveness of aluminum foil hats

(via Neatorama)

Time for all the nutjobs to pay attention! Some of the fine thinkers at MIT have taken the time to do an empirical study on the effectiveness of, well, like the headline says – aluminum foil hats. Since I know some folks use these fancy hats to block the UFO mind-reading rays (and probably the President Bush mind reading rays, the use of which was instituted shortly before he started using the weather controlling hurricane creating rays), you should probably spend some time finding out what protection they provide.
Here’s the abstract:

Among a fringe community of paranoids, aluminum helmets serve as the protective measure of choice against invasive radio signals. We investigate the efficacy of three aluminum helmet designs on a sample group of four individuals. Using a $250,000 network analyser, we find that although on average all helmets attenuate invasive radio frequencies in either directions (either emanating from an outside source, or emanating from the cranium of the subject), certain frequencies are in fact greatly amplified. These amplified frequencies coincide with radio bands reserved for government use according to the Federal Communication Commission (FCC). Statistical evidence suggests the use of helmets may in fact enhance the government’s invasive abilities. We speculate that the government may in fact have started the helmet craze for this reason.

Well, can you really trust them now? Maybe those hats work, and these guys are just part of the conspiracy? And why aluminum foil and not tin foil? Things that make you go hmmmmmm?

[tags]Aluminum foil hats, Protecting the brain from the UFO mind-reading rays[/tags]