Thrashing Through Cyberspace

The Latest Meme

No one tagged me, but here it is. You can see your own results by running this command in the terminal

history|awk '{print $2}'|sort|uniq -c|sort -rn|head

  77 ssh
  36 karp
  20 ls
  20 home
  19 man
  18 exit
  16 abs
  13 sudo
  12 scp
  12 cd

karp is an alias to ssh to a server at work. home is an alias to ssh to my G5 desktop. abs is another alias to ssh to a server at work.

3 AM

I'll tell you one thing. If it's 3 AM and there's a crisis brewing in the world, the one person I ABSOLUTELY DON'T WANT answering the White House phone is anyone who voted for the Iraq War.

Hillary Clinton's BS Speech

Apparently Hillary Clinton thinks that she's going to convince people to vote for her by giving a speech tonight in Ohio where she tells a bunch of lies about the differences herself and Barack Obama. The fake "contrast" she's been trying to convince people to believe is this: Barack Obama gives pretty speeches but doesn't have any ideas and has never done hard work, while she's just got the brain and power to "get things done." Here's a line from the speech:

"…It’s about picking a president who relies not just on words – but on work, hard work, to get America back to work. Someone who’s not just in the speeches business – but will get America back in the solutions business…"

Well, I call BS.

When Hillary Clinton finished her expensive private law school, she went to work for a big law firm representing corporate clients and serving on the boards of companies like  Wal*Mart -- going to lavish board meetings and rubbing elbows with the richest of the rich.

When Barack Obama graduated from his expensive private law school, he didn't go hang out with fat cats at corporate board meetings. He went to the streets of Chicago where he worked tirelessly and for little monetary gain helping people as a community organizer.

While Hilary Clinton took over the ceremonial duties of first ladydom, she was given important roles such as selecting the White House china and writing official first lady cookie recipes. Her major "solution" that she championed while First Lady, health care, was a complete and utter failure of legendary proportions and a poxmark on the Clinton presidency.

Meanwhile, Barack Obama was still working late hours helping those less fortunate and downtrodden in Chicago, eventually being elected to the Illinois State Senate where, working across party lines, he championed legislation like ethics reform, campaign finance reform, and tax relief for working families.

Barack Obama isn't just pretty speeches. And Hillary Clinton isn't just first lady formalisms. But only one candidate is on the attack with words she knows aren't true. Only one candidate is willing to resort to kind of divisive and dishonest politics of the past.

Words have important meanings, and not only has he spoken eloquently about the kind of change he would bring, he's used the written word to spell out exactly what an Obama Presidential Administration would look like in his book, The Audacity of Hope. A book he wrote while at the same time working as a United States Senator, the same hard work undertaken by Senator Clinton.

These attacks and lies about Barack Obama not "being ready" to lead on day 1; these attacks and lies about Barack Obama being nothing more than flowery language; these attacks and lies about Barack Obama's record...It's such a pathetic act of desperation and bullshit and lies.

Exactly the kind of politics people are tired of, and the reason Barack Obama will be the next President.

Published Photographer

The Future First Family Waves
Originally uploaded by acaben

This is really exciting. The PBS documentary "African American Lives" (premieres tomorrow, Feb 6, 2008 at 9 on PBS stations) is using one of my creative commons licensed Flickr pictures on the documentary's website to represent the year 2007 in their historical timeline.

Here's the photo they chose:

I also wanted to point out how awesome it was to deal with Jess Ludwig, the PBS person who contacted me for permission to use the photo. We arranged some terms that differed slightly from the Creative Commons license, and she couldn't have been nicer throughout the whole process.

One More Prod: Vote Obama

If you need a bit more than the awesome Lessig video below, my friend Tom recommends this piece by Michael Chabon endorsing Obama.

Tom writes:

...hope is what we look for. It's what lets us Believe. It's what makes Nations Great. It's what allows us to remove tarnish, to do good works and to lead. It sparks those, like me, who've stood aside as those with zeal, not hope, have bent the nation to their will. It's interesting to watch something like this happen, as I certainly didn't expect to be in the camp of the leftmost candidate.But here I am. And here you all are. Please take a second to read Michael Chabon's endorsement of Sen. Obama in today's Washington Post. It's probably some of the finest political writing I've read in a while. Then go vote.

(Via Adventures in Troubleshooting.)

Super Tuesday Prodding via Larry Lessig

It's now Super Tuesday, 6 hours until the first polls start to open here in the Eastern Time Zone. If you live in a state where there's a primary or caucus, please go vote.

And if you need some help deciding who to vote for, might I suggest a certain Illinois Senator. I spent a lot of time making the case for Barack Obama before he was even in the race, but lately people like Professor Lessig have done a better job. If you still would like to some convincing, here's his video on why Senator Obama is the right choice:

20 minutes or so on why I am 4Barack:

Click To Play

(Via Lessig Blog.)

The Blog Haitus Explained

There hasn't been much activity here lately. There hasn't been much activity over on MacSlash, either. And really, my presence has been pretty low everywhere online and offline for a while now. I figured I owe my readers here (all 3 of you) an explanation, and now that I've gotten a diagnosis, I guess it's time to share it with you. For at least a few years, I've been suffering from severe sleep apnea.

Certainly not a horrible diagnosis, but something that's definitely been debilitating and demoralizing. While you've been enjoying night after night of restful and restorative sleep, unbeknowst to me I've been jostled out of sleep an average of 86 times an hour, meaning I get virtually no rest or restoration when I sleep.

After several years of this I was barely functioning, using all of the energy I had to make sure I was staying on top of everything at my day job. By the time I arrived home in the evening, I just didn't have any energy left for blogging or keeping up with MacSlash. It's been frustrating, because I have big plans for this blog, MacSlash, and my new hobby, photography. Not to mention all of the additional work I'd like to do volunteering with Obama.

The good news is, soon I'm going to be able to get a full night's rest every night. I've found a doctor who's an expert in sleep disorders (as well as being a great primary care physician) and he's got a plan that should have me back up and running at full speed.

So, stay tuned for bigger and better things!

Obama Surges in "T-Shirt Primary" - Obama 47%, Clinton 18%

My friend and Co-Obama-Drafter John Hlinko has a new blog, where's he's sharing some of his insightful and witty political commentary on the horse race: BareNaked Pundits! Today, he pointed out some interesting facts about T-shirts:

Obama Surges in "T-Shirt Primary" - Obama 47%, Clinton 18%: "Folks, I've mentioned a few times in diaries how I'd become intrigued by watching T-shirt sales on CafePress.com as an indicator of how 'hot' or 'not ' a candidate was....After being nearly tied two weeks ago in weekly candidate sales (Obama at 28% of all sales, Hillary at 26%), Obama surged last week to 48%, while Hillary fell to 19%."

Is it scientific? Hell no. But... seems to me it's a hell of an interesting tea leaf to read when gauging grassroots enthusiasm or trying to figure if a candidate is waxing or waning.

Just an example of the humour and insight I think his new blog will bring to the political blog landscape. Check it out, and add him to your Feedreader.

(Via BareNaked Pundits!.)

SuperDelegates.org - Learn about the DNC Super Delegates

My friend Rick Klau writes about his new superdelegate site on his blog:

SuperDelegates.org - Learn about the DNC Super Delegates: "...Super delegates’ may actually have a hand in deciding who the Democratic nominee is. If you don’t know what a ‘super delegate’ is, don’t worry – a lot of people don’t. Each state has a number of ‘pledged’ delegates – these are the delegates chosen during the primary or caucus. (I’m simplifying, but that’s more or less the case.) In the Democratic party, those delegates are awarded on a proportional basis – if a candidate gets 50% of the vote, they’ll get 50% of that state’s delegates (Again, there’s a bit more to it, but for purposes of this discussion, that’ll do.)"

(Via Howard Dean in 2004 ::: A weblog by Rick Klau.)

PSU vs. Florida International

Airborn Catch
Originally uploaded by acaben

I spent Labour Day weekend in Bellefonte, seeing the family and enjoying the new sun room and deck my parents have put in. I also visited the House That JoePa Built, Beaver Stadium, for the first game of the season against Florida International. I took a bunch of pictures at the game, but this is one of my favorites. You can see more here.