Nobody Killed Kenny

I love it when people sign me up for conservative newsletters. It's so funny -- and original.

The Bush recovery continues!

Job Growth Meager, Markets Stunned

Another good point about SUVs

The law is rarely enforced, but most are illegal on California's residential streets.

Worse yet, the rest of us are subsidizing SUV drivers and the damage they do to the streets -- both in taxes and damage to our own vehicles.

Rumsfeld to be rebuked

But how can this be? Bush said he was doing a "superb" job.

Kerry's speech

I'm watching it now via the Internet, so I can't say how good it was yet. But NBC's news team seemed to like it.

And you gotta love that opening line.

Drudge posts fake photos

This is why the right-wind gossipmonger will never be the real journalist he so deperately wants to be.

His Photoshop retouching may seem a trivial thing, but it shows a couple of pretty big things about the Drudge-packer:

1) He steals other people's work without credit or payment. Yes, this from the same group that lambastes the poor for being lazy and dishonest.

2) He doesn't value truth, and is willing to post false photos as news. This is a big journalistic no-no. Concepts like bias, balance and fairness are subject to interpretation, but posting fake photos is a cut-and-dry issue. If he knowingly posts fake photos over trivial stories, how can we trust his so-called scoops? How many other fake photos has he posted?

3) He's stupid. If you're going to flip a photo and change the color of the traffic light, remember to also change the color of the cross-street light. That way, the photo doesn't show green lights in all directions. Also move around some of the other objects, or change the color of one of the cars.

What a chump.

UPDATE: Apparently he's taken the photo off the site. No correction. No apology.
DEVELOPING...

Why do Republicans hate America?

Sen. Shelby the subject of probe on 9/11 intelligence leak

Memo to Ann Coulter, and for that matter, Investor's Business Daily's editorial writers: of you're looking to call someone a traitor or accuse them of sedition, here's as example of something that actually fits the definition.

Birthday musings

A few milestones passed this week, and with a few big work deadlines past me, I can finally write about them.

July 15 was the second anniversary of my getting laid off from the Business Journal. As devastating as it was at the time, I’m happy to report that I’m better off financially and career-wise now than I was the day before the layoff.

As of this month, I’m free of long-term credit card debt, which was about $12,000 two years ago. And I have built up the recommended emergency savings of about four months worth of expenses vs. no savings at all two years ago. Now I can focus on saving for a home and retirement investing. I was laid off from a weekly, local newspaper with a sub-10,000 circulation. Now I work for a national daily with a circulation of almost 300,000. I’m making less money than I was — which kind of sucks in this housing market — but I’m better exposed and poised for bigger positions than I was before. And it’s nice to have tech firms scrambling to get MY attention for a change.

July 19 was my birthday, and I’m officially kicked out of the 18-34 age group. Which is probably appropriate, since I don’t watch much TV anymore or throw around money. I can see why advertisers don’t like old people. One of Andrea’s gifts was a computer game, if you can believe that. It’s the first PC-related gift she’s ever bought me.

And July 20 is the 35th anniversary of the moon landing. Still no rocket car. Sigh.

How to stop this page from popping out IE's sidebar

Select Internet Explorer's "Options" menu and click the security tab. Click "resticted sites," and add "http://*.tripod.com" to the list. Disable Javascript in the restricted zone if it's not already.

The other option, of course, is to switch to FireFox, which is quite good these days.

Sorry it's come to this, but I figured Tripod would disable the "feature" once they realized how annoying and useless it is.

We make pasta! Here's a picture of our homemade pasta-making adventure, as I test Blogger's new photo-posting tool. 

Free Gmail accounts

I have a few invites I can dole out to the first takers. E-mail me here. (This is a temporary address I'll delete once I've given out all my invites. So if your e-mail bounces, they're all gone.)

Yahoo Buys Web E-Mail Firm

Good news for Yahoo mail users. It's about to get a lot cooler, in an obvious counterswipe at Google's Gmail.

This is why competition is a good thing.

Surprise, surprise

Pentagon: Some Bush records destroyed

If this were about the Clintons, the wingnuts would be all over this.

And he's supposed to be one of the party's moderates

California education chief calls preschooler 'stupid dirty girl'

State Education Secretary Richard Riordan jokingly told a child her name, Isis, meant "stupid dirty girl," prompting the head of the California NAACP on Thursday to call for his resignation.

Riordan, the wealthy former Los Angeles mayor known for his support of public schools, startled even friends last week with the comments at a promotional event for summer reading at the Santa Barbara library.

Godspeed, little package!

My new computer is finally on its way, having just left FedEx's Phoenix sorting facility en route from New Mexico.

One would think that since Hewlett-Packard and I are both located in the Bay Area, the route would be a little more direct. This crazy global economy of ours.

Nonetheless, I am days away from having a reasonably speedy computer, just in time for Star Wars: Battlefront and Tribes:Vengence!

Oh, and work-related stuff, of course.

SATAN Causes High Memory Utilization in WUSER32

A funny collection of Microsoft Knowledge Base articles.

And then he told the crowd to go F- themselves

Yahoo! News - Cheney Fires Back in Debate Over Values: "Firing back in the debate over American values, Vice President Dick Cheney (news - web sites) used his first campaign bus tour Saturday to label Democrat John Kerry (news - web sites) 'on the left, out of the mainstream and out of touch with the conservative values of the heartland.' "

Bush salutes patriotism in West Virginia visit

MSNBC - Bush salutes patriotism in West Virginia visit: "the war in Iraq, President Bush said on Independence Day that America is safer because Saddam Hussein is in a prison cell."

Needless to say, 863 dead Americans would beg to differ -- especially considering that the number of Americans killed by Sadam or any other Iraqi since the Gulf War was exactly zero.

Pet Lovers Howl, So Governor Rolls Over

Pet Lovers Howl, So Governor Rolls Over: "The hectoring barks of animal lovers convinced Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to reverse himself Friday and keep California's law protecting stray dogs and cats at shelters."

Lesson for Schwarzenegger: no matter how much it makes sense on paper, never push a policy that involves killing puppies and kittens.