The Unholy Revolt!

Here we go again!

2011-04-19T10:59:00.000-07:00

So, once again, we have an apology to whoever reads my blog about the lack of updates.

News in brief:

Moving to California next month. That's right, I will be moving to beautiful Hollister, California (which is not even remotely related to the douchey clothing company based in Ohio). There's not much there (aside from my future in-laws), but it's about 40 minutes from everything, and the weather is beautiful year-round. The Army, of course, is making this difficult for me. Big surprise.

Taxes are all done and out of the way. Fun fact--I made so little that I ended up not owing any federal taxes, and they refunded every cent withheld from my paychecks. After holding on to it for so long, it'd be nice if they paid interest, but I'm sure they have more important things to spend it on, like wars in third-world countries. The military-industrial complex doesn't fund itself, y'know!

As an addendum to the first item: being "funemployed" is great and all, for the first few months after you stop worrying about it. But after a while it just gets depressing, especially when you're told that your unemployment claim's expired and your new one will pay about a third of what the old one did. It's even more so when you live somewhere with no sun, like southwestern PA for about nine months out of the year.

In closing: I plan to be back on the interwebs. Also, wedding gifts can be sent via our Honeyfund page *wink wink nudge nudge*.

Metal and such

2010-09-01T18:51:00.000-07:00

So this week, I'm in Charleston. Well, actually I'm a bit to the north, back to popping RAM into government computers, and trying to stay out of the way of trucks carrying missiles. Car of the week, if anyone's interested, is the Dodge Caliber. It's not bad at all, once you get used to the visibility, and the satellite radio means I can listen to metal while I drive.

Speaking of metal, I've finally gotten daedroth.com online. Daedroth, in case you haven't quite been keeping up with me off the blog, is a metal band from central California. The band is headed by my fiancee's brother, and holy crap can that dude shred on the guitar. There's only one song available for your downloading pleasure at the moment, and it's a somewhat unpolished live recording, but hopefully there'll be more available in the future.

Oh. Also, I'll be in the same place next week (unlike the rest of my team), and a hurricane's supposed to come close to where I am around the end of the week. Who says life isn't full of excitement?

Greetings from North Carolina!

2010-08-25T12:16:00.000-07:00

In my line of work, I get to travel to lots of places I'd normally never visit and drive vehicles I normally wouldn't drive. In the case of the latter, last week it was a minivan, and part of this week it's Prius, of all things. It's really not that bad a vehicle, although it can be disconcertingly quiet at times, and its interface is maddeningly idiosyncratic for those acquainted to, y'know, 'normal' cars.

Really, I guess it's the Mac of cars.

In other news, I have kicked the cigarettes in favor of an electronic cigarette. Already my lungs are starting to push out all the crap I've been putting in them now that I'm no longer keeping them sticky and dry with smoke. Or so I'm led to believe that's how it works. Fuck, I'm not the doctor in the family. Overall, the 'e-cigarettes' are pretty neat, but they take a little getting used to. Kinda like the Prius, eh? The only thing missing is the actual fire, which I find myself missing in times of intensified pissoffery, but other than that, it's satisfying enough that I don't need actual ol'skool smokes.

So yay.

And, in the third point of information for today, Rachelle has turned me on to Elliott Smith, and the songs "Coming Up Roses" and Waltz #2 (XO) have been stuck in my head for the past few days.

Minecraft Adventures!

2010-08-20T22:53:00.000-07:00

Yes, lately I've been hooked on a game called Minecraft. It's a fun little game wherein you build stuff with blocks, basically. The Survival mode is the most involved, since you have to collect resources by excavating blocks, and build weapons and tools to protect yourself from the hordes of monsters which spawn whenever it's dark. My latest (mis)adventure, pulled from a conversation with a friend of mine via AIM:

jesus fucking christ. i decided to try and bail from my lumber camp during night.

so i ran out of the cabin, had to cut down two zombies before I found my boat, sailed in the general direction of my beach house/marina. I saw something swimming towards me and thought a creeper had come to sink me at sea again. Turned out to be a chicken. Hard to see in the dark, after all.

I approach one of my canals and there's a fucking skeleton standing at the side, who starts taking pot shots at me as I sail through. One of the arrows hits me, but I get in a good swing with my sword as I pass by, knocking him back momentarily.

I come to the second canal, my house clearly in sight. Also, a creeper. He's just chilling by the wall. I can't try to dock now, since he'd just blow all my shit to smithereens--my loot box, furnace, workbench, rooftop farm/irrigation system, dock, boat, and me.

So I take the boat around to the island created by the canal and jump over, luring the creeper away from the house. After some furious stabbing and dodging, I manage to kill him (no fucking drops), push my boat closer to the dock, jump my moat, run into my house, and slam the door behind me. Fuck if I ever go outside at night again.

Yyyep. It's pretty intense. Perhaps I'll get screenshots up once it's light out, so people can better know just what exactly I'm talking about.

I Go Live, Part 2

2010-05-22T06:04:00.000-07:00

In an earlier post, I had mentioned that I got a webhosting account for all my silly little projects and such. Unfortunately, 110MB.com was being a bag of dicks about letting me apply upgrades to my account, and so I had no scripting capabilities, and thus, no point to using it. Since I've been working on another site, and I wanted to make it available to my client to view as I developed it, I decided to try again, and found an excellent free host at x10hosting. So, for now, anything that pops out of my head and onto the web will, after development on my own server (MAMP on my MacBook Pro), be findable at http://karunkun.x10hosting.com. Hooray!

(There seems to be a bit of dickery regarding MySQL at the moment, but a quick perusal of the forums seems to indicate that this kind of issue is solved rather quickly, and is not at all a regular occurrence.)

Updates!

2010-05-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I got back from Alexandria safe and sound, and resolved two out of three mysteries. I may post further on that subject if I get the time and there's enough interest. There will be photos.

Then I went to California for a while with the lovely lady, came back for drill, and found myself with little to do, as my employer temporarily ran out of stuff for me to do. This should be remedied soon.

Now I'm working on websites. At the moment, I've finished the layout for the site I'm making for an incredibly metal band called Daedroth. Still waiting on the content so I can get enough to upload to a host and whatnot. There might be another site in the works soon. With all that done, I find myself looking for more projects to work on. Maybe something to code in Python; I've not quite finished my D&D power-rolling program, although I've lost some interest in it at the time. Drat my attention span. Hmm.

Travelogue: Alexandria, Minnesota

2010-04-04T20:40:00.000-07:00

So. After hours on smallish planes, a layover in Chicago's wonderful O'Hare airport, and a 100-mile-plus long drive from Fargo, North Dakota (at a speed limit of 70 MPH, which I pretty much ig--CERTAINLY OBEYED, YES SIR OFFICER), I find myself at this week's destination: Alexandria, Minnesota. Here's a simplified map:

Anyway. This little town has its share of mysteries, as would be expected (And there's actually a town called Dilworth you can pass by on your way here).

But seriously. First off, this town has a population of around 12,000. There isn't a whole lot to see here, as far as my googling has revealed. Nonetheless, the Holiday Inn here, as well as the other various lodgings, are vast, sprawling structures, with far more rooms than I can ever imagine there being a need for. Have these places ever been filled to capacity? If so, when, and why? In a related line of questioning, why the hell is there a bank examiners office here? Are there actually banks headquartered this far from civilization?

Speaking of being far from civilization, there -is- one little point of interest: The Kensington Runestone. This is allegedly a runestone engraved by 14th-century Norse explorers, which, if authentic, would be quite astonishing, showing that the Norse had made it far into the North American continent well over a century before Columbus had even started off on his quest to stumble upon the Caribbean. However, it's been widely dismissed as bullpucky by most serious scholars. Y'see, although the text of the stone is Runic, the syntax seems to be far more modern than one would expect from 1362. On the other hand, the carved face of the stone, although clearly legible, still shows signs of having been worked many centuries ago. Locals still insist that it's genuine. You can read the wikipedia entry linkied above for further enlightenment. Hopefully, I'll have a few hours to check it out myself in the next few days (I wouldn't hold my breath, though).

The final mystery tonight..

wtf. Why is there a random belt on the restroom sink?

That's all for now, folks. Good night!

Movin' on up.

2010-03-05T08:47:00.000-08:00

So. New job, bailing to DC in a week or so it seems. Mad moneyz, fuck your recession. Booyah. Also, salmiac is weird stuff. And I'm a lazy blogger. Yes, I know this.

I Forgot He Was Releva--oh wait...

2010-01-27T21:06:00.000-08:00

So, to jump on the blogosphere bandwagon, I feel I have to chime in regarding ol' Tingles himself, Chris Matthews. Specifically, his reaction to the State of the Union speech.

"I forgot he was black tonight for an hour."

...

Really? Are you a fucking moron, Tingles? (That was a rhetorical question, by the way.) Do you really think the illusion of liberals as "Oh-so-enlightened," tolerant, open-minded people is going to get you a free pass on comments like this? Ahem.

Now, first off, there is the possibility that he meant this completely innocently, as in, "It made me forget all about the supposed racial divides among us, and I just saw him as another person." Of course, even in this most-lenient interpretation, it implies that he doesn't normally see black people as the same as him. Or, perhaps, more maliciously, this was a little slip showing that he does, in fact, feel the same way about people of other races as Che Guevara and other famous leftists did and still do. Post-racial my ass. Either way, I will be overcome with righteous schadenfreude-y delight if this means the end of his already irrelevant show. Who watches that crap, anyway?

Anyway, the speech itself was pretty unremarkable. It was, for all intents and purposes, a speech by a politician. He paid some lip service to the very ideologies that had been giving him trouble, made some vague promises (seriously, he can't be so naïve as to think that the government has more than a nudge of control over exports), promised to get rid of some taxes (shock!) while completely failing to assure anyone that he wasn't going to just help rape people on other taxes, and of course, spoke of the usual leftist talking points. He said a few things that, had I not witnessed his record thus far, might have given me hope, but yes, overall, it was just your average politician's speech. A man and his teleprompter.

In other news, I am an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church. It's not saying much, but I'm also considering getting together a congregation based not so much on dogmatic assumptions about the non-material plane, but on addressing the human condition here in this world. More on this as it develops.

Tk _was_ making me angry. Now I'm all psyched.

2009-12-08T15:44:00.000-08:00

Earlier, I cheered the sexiness that is Python. One of the reasons I haven't been blogging so much as of late is because I've been fiddling about with it. However, I have hit a stumbling block. I would like to make a GUI application. I really would. It seems most people use Tkinter for this. Tkinter seems to be the worst-documented module in the history of computing. I've found 'tutorials' that show you how to write a 'Hello World' app, followed by "Okay, now here's some technical shit, and a list of the widgets you can use but no documentation on how to implement them." I've encountered comprehensive lists of parameters and syntax, complete with code snippets that don't run. I've found idiosyncratic coding styles that are impossible to learn anything from. And as I am now using Rachelle's Mac, Pydev on Eclipse (which i am incredibly comfortable with, srsly guize, you should try it if you're not on a mac) is constantly bitching at me for perfectly legitimate code saying things aren't defined (when similar copypasta'd code caused no such issues back in windowsville) and therefore making it impossible to tell whether I'm actually dicking something up or if it's just being a PIECE OF MONKEY SHIT. Snarl.

So basically, if you've ever written something functional with Tkinter in Python, care to tell me how the hell you figured it out? Maybe Macs are just Kryptonite to my mad Google-fu, but I can't find shit on this. At the moment I just want to make a window with a drop down menu and some checkboxes or somewhat. Perhaps have it generate a message box. Nothing too tricky. What the balls.

UPDATE: I may have figured it out. Mac+Eclipse is still being a whiny bitch, but I am incredibly awesome. Just thought you should know.

UPDATE TO UPDATE: Srsly. My awesomeness cannot be expressed in words. NOT EVEN THE INTERWEBS CAN STOP ME NOW! (The lack thereof, however, just might)

Why I'm A Big Fan of the Cap'n

2009-11-03T19:39:00.000-08:00

I'm sure you can see it on my blagroll, but just for emphasis, plz read nao.

Long time, no post.

2009-11-03T03:21:00.000-08:00

I don't want to get too much into the habit of not updating, so here is another post from yours truly. I've decided to back off temporarily from political rants as writing them really just depresses me and I figure that if all the things that concern me come to pass, I'll just die of alcohol poisoning. At any rate, I have been playing (probably too much) Tropico 3. I hadn't really heard of the Tropico series of games until last week when I decided to purchase and download online (the manual is available online at some places, but the game is fairly intuitive). The graphics aren't all that special (although they are kind of pretty) but really, the game is digital crack. Think of it as "Banana Republic Tycoon" and you might have a close idea. Basically the idea is, you are "El Presidente" of a small Caribbean island during the Cold War. Nothing is built without your say-so, and the people are pretty much dependent on your planning for everything, unless you don't build enough housing--they'll just erect shacks all over the island and drive tourists away. Think of it as BHO's dream come true--ohwait, there's the ranting. Truth be told, I made a custom Presidente modelled after Our Great Fearless Leader for one of the scenarios, but alas, I was invaded by the US within a few years. Go figure.

Czars We Can Believe In

2009-09-16T19:30:00.001-07:00

Seriously, this is awesome.

Transcript: Obama's Speech Before Congress, Healthcare Edition (with comments)

2009-09-09T18:26:00.001-07:00

I just finished watching President Obama's speech to Congress regarding the healthcare situation. Shortly afterwards, joy of joys, I managed to snag a transcript online from the Anchorage Daily News.

I've reproduced most the President's words here, interspersed with commentary of my own.The president is indented all block-quotes-y like, and I pop in all left-justified. In case you couldn't tell.

Madame Speaker, Vice President Biden, Members of Congress, and the American people:
When I spoke here last winter, this nation was facing the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. We were losing an average of 700,000 jobs per month. Credit was frozen. And our financial system was on the verge of collapse.
As any American who is still looking for work or a way to pay their bills will tell you, we are by no means out of the woods. A full and vibrant recovery is many months away. And I will not let up until those Americans who seek jobs can find them; until those businesses that seek capital and credit can thrive; until all responsible homeowners can stay in their homes. That is our ultimate goal. But thanks to the bold and decisive action we have taken since January, I can stand here with confidence and say that we have pulled this economy back from the brink.

I would argue that any recovery has been in spite of Congressional interference, but anyway...

I want to thank the members of this body for your efforts and your support in these last several months, and especially those who have taken the difficult votes that have put us on a path to recovery. I also want to thank the American people for their patience and resolve during this trying time for our nation.
But we did not come here just to clean up crises. We came to build a future. So tonight, I return to speak to all of you about an issue that is central to that future – and that is the issue of health care.
I am not the first President to take up this cause, but I am determined to be the last. It has now been nearly a century since Theodore Roosevelt first called for health care reform. And ever since, nearly every President and Congress, whether Democrat or Republican, has attempted to meet this challenge in some way. A bill for comprehensive health reform was first introduced by John Dingell Sr. in 1943. Sixty-five years later, his son continues to introduce that same bill at the beginning of each session.
Our collective failure to meet this challenge – year after year, decade after decade – has led us to a breaking point. Everyone understands the extraordinary hardships that are placed on the uninsured, who live every day just one accident or illness away from bankruptcy. These are not primarily people on welfare. These are middle-class Americans. Some can't get insurance on the job. Others are self-employed, and can't afford it, since buying insurance on your own costs you three times as much as the coverage you get from your employer. Many other Americans who are willing and able to pay are still denied insurance due to previous illnesses or conditions that insurance companies decide are too risky or expensive to cover.

"One accident or illness away..." Really, the preceding bit seems like more of an emotionally charged appeal, but I'll let it slide because there are some valid points. I haven't personally verified the "three times as much" bit.

We are the only advanced democracy on Earth – the only wealthy nation – that allows such hardships for millions of its people. There are now more than thirty million American citizens who cannot get coverage. In just a two year period, one in every three Americans goes without health care coverage at some point. And every day, 14,000 Americans lose their coverage. In other words, it can happen to anyone.

I'm pretty sure, though, that the "one in three" figure would be far less if you were only counting people who consistently could not obtain coverage. Factoring in those with temporary lapses, quite possibly shorter than a few days, would of course inflate the figure. Anyway.

But the problem that plagues the health care system is not just a problem of the uninsured. Those who do have insurance have never had less security and stability than they do today. More and more Americans worry that if you move, lose your job, or change your job, you'll lose your health insurance too. More and more Americans pay their premiums, only to discover that their insurance company has dropped their coverage when they get sick, or won't pay the full cost of care. It happens every day.
One man from Illinois lost his coverage in the middle of chemotherapy because his insurer found that he hadn't reported gallstones that he didn't even know about. They delayed his treatment, and he died because of it. Another woman from Texas was about to get a double mastectomy when her insurance company canceled her policy because she forgot to declare a case of acne. By the time she had her insurance reinstated, her breast cancer more than doubled in size. That is heart-breaking, it is wrong, and no one should be treated that way in the United States of America.

The only problem I have with this rhetoric is that all too often, a few existing problems are used to push a 'solution' that tends to cause even more problems, and often doesn't solve the initial ones. Either way, emotional plea. Let's get to the meat of this thing.

Then there's the problem of rising costs. We spend one-and-a-half times more per person on health care than any other country, but we aren't any healthier for it.

Dangerously subjective conclusion, depending on how you measure health. Also, are resulting levels of health being compared directly to how much one pays, or is everything lumped into national averages?

This is one of the reasons that insurance premiums have gone up three times faster than wages. It's why so many employers – especially small businesses – are forcing their employees to pay more for insurance, or are dropping their coverage entirely. It's why so many aspiring entrepreneurs cannot afford to open a business in the first place, and why American businesses that compete internationally – like our automakers – are at a huge disadvantage. And it's why those of us with health insurance are also paying a hidden and growing tax for those without it – about $1000 per year that pays for somebody else's emergency room and charitable care.

While it's true that the inability of patients to pay for their care tends to drive the cost of medical treatment, and indirectly the premiums of insurance plans that must pay these higher costs, the way this is presented ("a hidden and growing tax") sounds a bit inaccurate, and perhaps a bit dishonest.

Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. When health care costs grow at the rate they have, it puts greater pressure on programs like Medicare and Medicaid. If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined. Put simply, our health care problem is our deficit problem. Nothing else even comes close.

Okay, I'll agree with that. Medicare and Medicaid, like most other large government bureaucracies, are huge drains on revenue.

These are the facts. Nobody disputes them. We know we must reform this system. The question is how.
There are those on the left who believe that the only way to fix the system is through a single-payer system like Canada's, where we would severely restrict the private insurance market and have the government provide coverage for everyone.

And we all know how great monopolies are. Even better when they're enforced by guys with guns.

On the right, there are those who argue that we should end the employer-based system and leave individuals to buy health insurance on their own.

The "leave...on their own" is pretty loaded. As a libertarian, i'm pretty much against there being a government system specifically regarding healthcare altogether, but maybe a compromise can be reached...

I have to say that there are arguments to be made for both approaches. But either one would represent a radical shift that would disrupt the health care most people currently have. Since health care represents one-sixth of our economy, I believe it makes more sense to build on what works and fix what doesn't, rather than try to build an entirely new system from scratch. And that is precisely what those of you in Congress have tried to do over the past several months.

Agree with all but the last sentence, based on bits I've heard from some people in charge. But I'm sure those were just the lunatic fringe and we'll have them kicked out in the next election, right, America? :)

During that time, we have seen Washington at its best and its worst.

lol @ 'best.'

We have seen many in this chamber work tirelessly for the better part of this year to offer thoughtful ideas about how to achieve reform. Of the five committees asked to develop bills, four have completed their work, and the Senate Finance Committee announced today that it will move forward next week.

I do hope that Congress is writing its own bills now, rather than blindly voting on huge unread bills produced by special-interest groups. That'd be nice. Somehow I'm not terribly reassured, though.

That has never happened before. Our overall efforts have been supported by an unprecedented coalition of doctors and nurses; hospitals, seniors' groups and even drug companies – many of whom opposed reform in the past. And there is agreement in this chamber on about eighty percent of what needs to be done, putting us closer to the goal of reform than we have ever been.

I'm no Senator, but can't we vote on what's agreed upon and work out the other details later? Breaking the bills into small, specific chunks should allow Congress to easily pass the legislation that everyone knows is good, without having to make compromises on more distasteful bits. Then each part can be passed on its own merit. If you're fighting so strongly for a piece of legislation, then there should be enough merit to it for you to convince a majority of your colleagues to join your vote. Otherwise, perhaps it isn't what's best for the entire nation, and should be presented to a more local level of government, or dropped altogether.

But what we have also seen in these last months is the same partisan spectacle that only hardens the disdain many Americans have toward their own government. Instead of honest debate, we have seen scare tactics. Some have dug into unyielding ideological camps that offer no hope of compromise. Too many have used this as an opportunity to score short-term political points, even if it robs the country of our opportunity to solve a long-term challenge. And out of this blizzard of charges and counter-charges, confusion has reigned.
Well the time for bickering is over. The time for games has passed. Now is the season for action. Now is when we must bring the best ideas of both parties together, and show the American people that we can still do what we were sent here to do. Now is the time to deliver on health care.
The plan I’m announcing tonight would meet three basic goals:
It will provide more security and stability to those who have health insurance. It will provide insurance to those who don't. And it will slow the growth of health care costs for our families, our businesses, and our government. It's a plan that asks everyone to take responsibility for meeting this challenge – not just government and insurance companies, but employers and individuals. And it's a plan that incorporates ideas from Senators and Congressmen; from Democrats and Republicans – and yes, from some of my opponents in both the primary and general election.

This sounds like a very tall order.

Here are the details that every American needs to know about this plan:
First, if you are among the hundreds of millions of Americans who already have health insurance through your job, Medicare, Medicaid, or the VA, nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have. Let me repeat this: nothing in our plan requires you to change what you have.

Allow me to digress for a moment. Cass Sunstein believes in a strategy of "nudging" citizens to act in a certain way, without openly forcing them. Just because this plan doesn't openly ban private insurance doesn't mean that it won't harm insurance companies to the point of leaving a public option as the only viable path, especially when you consider that the public option, being a government program, can draw from tax dollars and deficit spending until the people revolt or the dollar collapses. The principle of "nudge" is why you always have to look deeper than a politician's words. Anyway.

What this plan will do is to make the insurance you have work better for you. Under this plan, it will be against the law for insurance companies to deny you coverage because of a pre-existing condition.

Sounds nice at first, but insurance companies will certainly have to raise premiums if they're forced to take high-risk customers. Or they can always go out of business.

As soon as I sign this bill, it will be against the law for insurance companies to drop your coverage when you get sick or water it down when you need it most.

As much as I dislike government interference in private business, I feel this could be considered protection from fraud, since a patient with a terminal disease really isn't able to take their business elsewhere when their insurer decides to drop them. Really, it's kind of like the company backing out of a bet after they've already lost. So I have to agree with this point.

They will no longer be able to place some arbitrary cap on the amount of coverage you can receive in a given year or a lifetime. We will place a limit on how much you can be charged for out-of-pocket expenses, because in the United States of America, no one should go broke because they get sick.

On the flip side, nobody should be forced to pay because somebody else didn't prepare for an unexpected sickness.

And insurance companies will be required to cover, with no extra charge, routine checkups and preventive care, like mammograms and colonoscopies – because there's no reason we shouldn't be catching diseases like breast cancer and colon cancer before they get worse. That makes sense, it saves money, and it saves lives.

Eh. I'll concede that. As far as regulation goes, this is actually agreeable and seems to do more good than harm.

That's what Americans who have health insurance can expect from this plan – more security and stability.
Now, if you're one of the tens of millions of Americans who don't currently have health insurance, the second part of this plan will finally offer you quality, affordable choices. If you lose your job or change your job, you will be able to get coverage. If you strike out on your own and start a small business, you will be able to get coverage. We will do this by creating a new insurance exchange – a marketplace where individuals and small businesses will be able to shop for health insurance at competitive prices. Insurance companies will have an incentive to participate in this exchange because it lets them compete for millions of new customers. As one big group, these customers will have greater leverage to bargain with the insurance companies for better prices and quality coverage. This is how large companies and government employees get affordable insurance. It's how everyone in this Congress gets affordable insurance. And it's time to give every American the same opportunity that we've given ourselves.

As long as the government isn't too heavily entrenched within this 'exchange,' it actually sounds pretty good. More competition is almost always a good thing, as long as it's fair competition. Please note that taxpayer-subsidized competition is not fair.

For those individuals and small businesses who still cannot afford the lower-priced insurance available in the exchange, we will provide tax credits, the size of which will be based on your need. And all insurance companies that want access to this new marketplace will have to abide by the consumer protections I already mentioned. This exchange will take effect in four years, which will give us time to do it right. In the meantime, for those Americans who can't get insurance today because they have pre-existing medical conditions, we will immediately offer low-cost coverage that will protect you against financial ruin if you become seriously ill. This was a good idea when Senator John McCain proposed it in the campaign, it's a good idea now, and we should embrace it.

"Tax credits"...Now, if these credits are actually taken from tax revenue, it's reducing the tax burden on citizens and allowing them to buy something they need. However, I'm worried these will be more along the lines of handouts, and more along the lines of redistribution.

Now, even if we provide these affordable options, there may be those – particularly the young and healthy – who still want to take the risk and go without coverage. There may still be companies that refuse to do right by their workers. The problem is, such irresponsible behavior costs all the rest of us money. If there are affordable options and people still don't sign up for health insurance, it means we pay for those people's expensive emergency room visits. If some businesses don't provide workers health care, it forces the rest of us to pick up the tab when their workers get sick, and gives those businesses an unfair advantage over their competitors. And unless everybody does their part, many of the insurance reforms we seek – especially requiring insurance companies to cover pre-existing conditions – just can't be achieved.

Demonizing those who don't take insurance isn't the way. Perhaps penalties for delinquency on hospital bills? I've been able to pay out-of-pocket for minor medical care when I had no insurance. My mother had no insurance when she was hospitalized for abdominal issues, and couldn't pay the entire bill. No, she didn't die, and she didn't skip out. She set up a monthly payment plan with the hospital and made payments. (Eventually, a private foundation stepped in and covered the rest of the costs, further weakening arguments for government care)

That's why under my plan, individuals will be required to carry basic health insurance – just as most states require you to carry auto insurance. Likewise, businesses will be required to either offer their workers health care, or chip in to help cover the cost of their workers. There will be a hardship waiver for those individuals who still cannot afford coverage, and 95% of all small businesses, because of their size and narrow profit margin, would be exempt from these requirements. But we cannot have large businesses and individuals who can afford coverage game the system by avoiding responsibility to themselves or their employees. Improving our health care system only works if everybody does their part.

I don't like the requirement; again, punishing only those who screw over everyone else is better than preemptively screwing everybody, but the exemptions make this somewhat palatable, I guess. At least it doesn't sound like they're trying to stomp entrepreneurs.

While there remain some significant details to be ironed out, I believe a broad consensus exists for the aspects of the plan I just outlined: consumer protections for those with insurance, an exchange that allows individuals and small businesses to purchase affordable coverage, and a requirement that people who can afford insurance get insurance.

I really hate the word 'consensus.'

And I have no doubt that these reforms would greatly benefit Americans from all walks of life, as well as the economy as a whole. Still, given all the misinformation that's been spread over the past few months, I realize that many Americans have grown nervous about reform. So tonight I'd like to address some of the key controversies that are still out there.
Some of people's concerns have grown out of bogus claims spread by those whose only agenda is to kill reform at any cost. The best example is the claim, made not just by radio and cable talk show hosts, but prominent politicians, that we plan to set up panels of bureaucrats with the power to kill off senior citizens. Such a charge would be laughable if it weren't so cynical and irresponsible. It is a lie, plain and simple.

Agreed. Although, to their credit, the term "End of Life Counseling" is a pretty bleak-sounding phrase. I thought you guys had better spin-doctors than that!

There are also those who claim that our reform effort will insure illegal immigrants. This, too, is false – the reforms I'm proposing would not apply to those who are here illegally.

I'll believe it when I see it.

And one more misunderstanding I want to clear up – under our plan, no federal dollars will be used to fund abortions, and federal conscience laws will remain in place.

I should hope so. Even though I'm not about to force people to accept my moral views by banning abortion, I certainly am not willing to pay for a procedure that is rarely vital and in my opinion morally repugnant.

My health care proposal has also been attacked by some who oppose reform as a "government takeover" of the entire health care system. As proof, critics point to a provision in our plan that allows the uninsured and small businesses to choose a publicly-sponsored insurance option, administered by the government just like Medicaid or Medicare.
So let me set the record straight. My guiding principle is, and always has been, that consumers do better when there is choice and competition. Unfortunately, in 34 states, 75% of the insurance market is controlled by five or fewer companies. In Alabama, almost 90% is controlled by just one company. Without competition, the price of insurance goes up and the quality goes down. And it makes it easier for insurance companies to treat their customers badly – by cherry-picking the healthiest individuals and trying to drop the sickest; by overcharging small businesses who have no leverage; and by jacking up rates.

Yes, monopolies suck. Oligarchies often suck only slightly less. So far so good. This should be easily addressed by the aforementioned 'exchange' though, right?

Insurance executives don't do this because they are bad people. They do it because it's profitable. As one former insurance executive testified before Congress, insurance companies are not only encouraged to find reasons to drop the seriously ill; they are rewarded for it. All of this is in service of meeting what this former executive called "Wall Street's relentless profit expectations."
Now, I have no interest in putting insurance companies out of business.

Some of your previous statements might lead one to believe otherwise...

They provide a legitimate service, and employ a lot of our friends and neighbors. I just want to hold them accountable. The insurance reforms that I've already mentioned would do just that. But an additional step we can take to keep insurance companies honest is by making a not-for-profit public option available in the insurance exchange. Let me be clear – it would only be an option for those who don't have insurance. No one would be forced to choose it, and it would not impact those of you who already have insurance. In fact, based on Congressional Budget Office estimates, we believe that less than 5% of Americans would sign up.

The CBO isn't known for its stunning record of accuracy. I might believe this once I have more information on it, but for now I see lots of potential for abuse here. After all, with near-unlimited funds, a public option can easily force private competitors out of business. Then, if people actually start grumbling about the deficit this would cause (thus endangering the reelection of the politicians), it can gradually slip back to a bare minimum, high-premium plan. With no competition remaining, congratulations, your health is now at the mercy of politics. Sure, it's a fairly extreme scenario, but if you really think the political class is as altruistic as they try to tell you they are, well then I've got a bridge to sell you.

Despite all this, the insurance companies and their allies don't like this idea. They argue that these private companies can't fairly compete with the government. And they'd be right if taxpayers were subsidizing this public insurance option. But they won't be. I have insisted that like any private insurance company, the public insurance option would have to be self-sufficient and rely on the premiums it collects.

If this is indeed the case, then that would go a long way towards preventing my previously mentioned scenario. But I can't help but feel this would go the path of, say, the Post Office, or Amtrak. I'd have to see it written in the bill before I'd voice any support for it.

But by avoiding some of the overhead that gets eaten up at private companies by profits, excessive administrative costs and executive salaries, it could provide a good deal for consumers. It would also keep pressure on private insurers to keep their policies affordable and treat their customers better, the same way public colleges and universities provide additional choice and competition to students without in any way inhibiting a vibrant system of private colleges and universities.

Heh. I wouldn't want to use academia as a good example for anything, but ymmv.

It's worth noting that a strong majority of Americans still favor a public insurance option of the sort I've proposed tonight.

I'd like to see your numbers and polling sample.

But its impact shouldn't be exaggerated – by the left, the right, or the media. It is only one part of my plan, and should not be used as a handy excuse for the usual Washington ideological battles. To my progressive friends, I would remind you that for decades, the driving idea behind reform has been to end insurance company abuses and make coverage affordable for those without it. The public option is only a means to that end – and we should remain open to other ideas that accomplish our ultimate goal. And to my Republican friends, I say that rather than making wild claims about a government takeover of health care, we should work together to address any legitimate concerns you may have.
For example, some have suggested that that the public option go into effect only in those markets where insurance companies are not providing affordable policies. Others propose a co-op or another non-profit entity to administer the plan. These are all constructive ideas worth exploring. But I will not back down on the basic principle that if Americans can't find affordable coverage, we will provide you with a choice. And I will make sure that no government bureaucrat or insurance company bureaucrat gets between you and the care that you need.

Another tall order. The government getting involved with something and not drowning everything in bureaucrats? I'll believe it when I see it.

Finally, let me discuss an issue that is a great concern to me, to members of this chamber, and to the public – and that is how we pay for this plan.
Here's what you need to know. First, I will not sign a plan that adds one dime to our deficits – either now or in the future. Period.

"Read my lips: No new taxes." Sound familiar?

And to prove that I'm serious, there will be a provision in this plan that requires us to come forward with more spending cuts if the savings we promised don't materialize. Part of the reason I faced a trillion dollar deficit when I walked in the door of the White House is because too many initiatives over the last decade were not paid for – from the Iraq War to tax breaks for the wealthy. I will not make that same mistake with health care.

Not to mention the TARP bailout. But of course, Mr. President, the deficit you inherited pales in comparison to the deficit you helped add when you signed the 'stimulus' bill into law. I'd love to believe you now, but your past actions betray you.

Second, we've estimated that most of this plan can be paid for by finding savings within the existing health care system – a system that is currently full of waste and abuse. Right now, too much of the hard-earned savings and tax dollars we spend on health care doesn't make us healthier. That's not my judgment – it's the judgment of medical professionals across this country. And this is also true when it comes to Medicare and Medicaid.

If all this waste, fraud, and abuse can finally be rooted out, I'll be ecstatic. Pity the money has to go into yet another government program. With the money people will save on taxes, they probably wouldn't need health insurance, or could easily afford private insurance. Unless they went and spent it all on cars and TV's and Big Macs. And that, my friends, is where personal responsibility enters the picture. Please don't screw me just because someone else is a moron. Really, you're only pissing in the gene pool.

In fact, I want to speak directly to America's seniors for a moment, because Medicare is another issue that's been subjected to demagoguery and distortion during the course of this debate.
More than four decades ago, this nation stood up for the principle that after a lifetime of hard work, our seniors should not be left to struggle with a pile of medical bills in their later years. That is how Medicare was born. And it remains a sacred trust that must be passed down from one generation to the next. That is why not a dollar of the Medicare trust fund will be used to pay for this plan.
The only thing this plan would eliminate is the hundreds of billions of dollars in waste and fraud, as well as unwarranted subsidies in Medicare that go to insurance companies – subsidies that do everything to pad their profits and nothing to improve your care. And we will also create an independent commission of doctors and medical experts charged with identifying more waste in the years ahead.
These steps will ensure that you – America's seniors – get the benefits you've been promised. They will ensure that Medicare is there for future generations. And we can use some of the savings to fill the gap in coverage that forces too many seniors to pay thousands of dollars a year out of their own pocket for prescription drugs. That's what this plan will do for you. So don't pay attention to those scary stories about how your benefits will be cut – especially since some of the same folks who are spreading these tall tales have fought against Medicare in the past, and just this year supported a budget that would have essentially turned Medicare into a privatized voucher program. That will never happen on my watch. I will protect Medicare.
Now, because Medicare is such a big part of the health care system, making the program more efficient can help usher in changes in the way we deliver health care that can reduce costs for everybody. We have long known that some places, like the Intermountain Healthcare in Utah or the Geisinger Health System in rural Pennsylvania, offer high-quality care at costs below average. The commission can help encourage the adoption of these common-sense best practices by doctors and medical professionals throughout the system – everything from reducing hospital infection rates to encouraging better coordination between teams of doctors.

Government should take lessons from the private sector whenever possible, since competition leads to increased efficiency. Good call.

Reducing the waste and inefficiency in Medicare and Medicaid will pay for most of this plan. Much of the rest would be paid for with revenues from the very same drug and insurance companies that stand to benefit from tens of millions of new customers. This reform will charge insurance companies a fee for their most expensive policies, which will encourage them to provide greater value for the money – an idea which has the support of Democratic and Republican experts. And according to these same experts, this modest change could help hold down the cost of health care for all of us in the long-run.

Analyzing value vs. cost for the purposes of assessing fees sounds like a job for more overpaid bureaucrats. Are citizens really too inept to tell for themselves whether a plan is a good deal or not? Again, the 'exchange' mentioned earlier seems to be all one would need.

Finally, many in this chamber – particularly on the Republican side of the aisle – have long insisted that reforming our medical malpractice laws can help bring down the cost of health care. I don't believe malpractice reform is a silver bullet, but I have talked to enough doctors to know that defensive medicine may be contributing to unnecessary costs. So I am proposing that we move forward on a range of ideas about how to put patient safety first and let doctors focus on practicing medicine. I know that the Bush Administration considered authorizing demonstration projects in individual states to test these issues. It's a good idea, and I am directing my Secretary of Health and Human Services to move forward on this initiative today.

A-fucking-men. Patients skipping out on the bill may be one contributing factor, but let's not forget the effects of (a.) malpractice insurance against frivolous lawsuits and (b.) all the excess procedures doctors must perform to cover their asses in the rare event something goes wrong.

Add it all up, and the plan I'm proposing will cost around $900 billion over ten years – less than we have spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, and less than the tax cuts for the wealthiest few Americans that Congress passed at the beginning of the previous administration. Most of these costs will be paid for with money already being spent – but spent badly – in the existing health care system. The plan will not add to our deficit. The middle-class will realize greater security, not higher taxes. And if we are able to slow the growth of health care costs by just one-tenth of one percent each year, it will actually reduce the deficit by $4 trillion over the long term.

I'd like to actually see the numbers on this, if anyone has them. Even before the "$30,000 for an amputated foot" comment I've been reluctant to trust any numbers the President produces. In other news, saying the government spends money badly is like saying water is wet.

This is the plan I'm proposing. It's a plan that incorporates ideas from many of the people in this room tonight – Democrats and Republicans. And I will continue to seek common ground in the weeks ahead. If you come to me with a serious set of proposals, I will be there to listen. My door is always open.
But know this: I will not waste time with those who have made the calculation that it's better politics to kill this plan than improve it. I will not stand by while the special interests use the same old tactics to keep things exactly the way they are. If you misrepresent what's in the plan, we will call you out. And I will not accept the status quo as a solution. Not this time. Not now.
Everyone in this room knows what will happen if we do nothing. Our deficit will grow. More families will go bankrupt. More businesses will close. More Americans will lose their coverage when they are sick and need it most. And more will die as a result. We know these things to be true.

More fearmongering. I'm not passing judgment; emotional appeals are a powerful persuasive tactic. I'm just calling a spade a bloody shovel.

That is why we cannot fail. Because there are too many Americans counting on us to succeed – the ones who suffer silently, and the ones who shared their stories with us at town hall meetings, in emails, and in letters....

Long spiel about the late Sen. Kennedy omitted. It's long and doesn't have much to comment on. If you wish to read the eulogy, it's in the complete transcript linkied above.

....In 1933, when over half of our seniors could not support themselves and millions had seen their savings wiped away, there were those who argued that Social Security would lead to socialism.

Slippery slope, etc. etc. I can go into further detail in another post.

But the men and women of Congress stood fast, and we are all the better for it. In 1965, when some argued that Medicare represented a government takeover of health care, members of Congress, Democrats and Republicans, did not back down. They joined together so that all of us could enter our golden years with some basic peace of mind.
You see, our predecessors understood that government could not, and should not, solve every problem. They understood that there are instances when the gains in security from government action are not worth the added constraints on our freedom. But they also understood that the danger of too much government is matched by the perils of too little; that without the leavening hand of wise policy, markets can crash, monopolies can stifle competition, and the vulnerable can be exploited.

Especially in the case of crashing markets, most such problems resolve themselves best without government intervention. Politicians make terrible economists. As for the latter two, we do already have antitrust legislation and numerous laws against fraud. All it takes is enforcement.

And they knew that when any government measure, no matter how carefully crafted or beneficial, is subject to scorn; when any efforts to help people in need are attacked as un-American; when facts and reason are thrown overboard and only timidity passes for wisdom, and we can no longer even engage in a civil conversation with each other over the things that truly matter – that at that point we don't merely lose our capacity to solve big challenges. We lose something essential about ourselves.
What was true then remains true today. I understand how difficult this health care debate has been. I know that many in this country are deeply skeptical that government is looking out for them. I understand that the politically safe move would be to kick the can further down the road – to defer reform one more year, or one more election, or one more term.

Oh, like paying for the stimulus bill? Sorry--cheap shot.

But that's not what the moment calls for. That's not what we came here to do. We did not come to fear the future. We came here to shape it. I still believe we can act even when it's hard. I still believe we can replace acrimony with civility, and gridlock with progress. I still believe we can do great things, and that here and now we will meet history's test.
Because that is who we are. That is our calling. That is our character. Thank you, God Bless You, and may God Bless the United States of America.

All in all, not too bad. There was much less FUD than I had been expecting, perhaps because he was speaking before a mix of both supporters and opponents, and for the most part, even though it's not really compatible with my libertarian ideals, it strikes a reasonable compromise. It might be able to actually help people without screwing over the country.

In short: I like the 'exchange' option, allowing customers to choose from a wider selection of health insurance providers. Fair competition is a good thing. I don't like mandatory health insurance. There are ways to deter people from inability to pay hospital bills that don't require force or coercion against the entire population. The public option seems unnecessary at best, and potentially disastrous at worst. If the 'exchange' idea will truly open up markets to more competition, a publicly-run alternative is unlikely to make much of a difference at all, even without the need to make profits. On the contrary, if the self-sufficiency guarantee isn't ironclad, it -could- be used simply to destroy private insurers. I'm not saying this is definitely anyone's plan, but if a government plan can be used for evil, some power-hungry individual somewhere down the line will ensure it happens.

That's all I really have to say. Comments are appreciated; I always enjoy a good, rational debate.

Just keep it civil, guys.

Late is better than never -OR- Spam, spam, spam, code, and spam.

2009-08-28T03:04:00.000-07:00

So I've finally started making a conscious effort to get back into coding again. I have chosen Python as my weapon of choice for this endeavor. It seems terribly easy to learn so far.

First, a bit of history:

My first experience with computers was waay back when I was a wee lad of maybe four or so. We had a Commodore VIC-20, and my dad showed me a simple looping program that covered the screen with a repeating bit of text (in this case, "CHRIS"). Unfortunately, I didn't have much more experience until a few years later, on a Windows 3.1 machine. Again, the paternal one introduced me to the DOS command line, and with a few little programs I had gleaned from a magazine, I started writing BASIC code. I would type up the programs, run them, and review the code to learn how it worked. It wasn't anything fancy, but I enjoyed the thrill of being able to make the computer do what I wanted it to do. In high school, I applied my knowledge of BASIC to the pursuit of writing fun little programs for my graphing calculator, but overall not challenging myself too much, until I started up again by learning php during my college days, as it was the primary language used to write an immersive society-simulating/role-playing game called Cantr II, to which I was slightly addicted. I wrote a few simplistic little games and web applications, the source code to which has since gone to the great bit bucket in the sky. With a lack of projects to which I could apply my knowledge, my abilities stagnated and eventually decayed somewhat. I had made a few abortive attempts to learn new programming languages during the following years. My usual learning process of reading other peoples' source code was hampered by the fact that although I could understand the basics in most cases, anything particularly useful was too complex and often commented for the benefit of those already proficient in the language.

Now, Python. The only thing I've had to get used to in learning it is the fact that it actually requires the use of whitespace (indentations, mostly), but this isn't all too difficult to grasp, and it ensures I'll build a habit of writing easily-read code. It's an interpreted language, so I can see the results of my code moments after writing it, without having to recompile after every change I make. In interactive mode, errors are quickly pointed out, so you needn't wait until you attempt to execute it, only to sift through the code in hopes of finding your screw-up. Sure, as a scripting language, there isn't much you can do in terms of memory management or directly controlling the hardware with Python alone, but those are tasks left to languages in which I shall become proficient with time and experience.

In short, Python is an excellent language both for newbies and experienced coders wishing to easily increase their productivity. There is far less wrestling with linguistic peculiarities, leaving you free to focus on making code that does what you want. But don't take my word for it.

Anyway. If anyone wants to give me some projects to work on, I can get to them as soon as my proficiency allows. I do, after all, need to apply my skills as I learn them to ensure I don't immediately forget everything.

What to do...

2009-08-24T23:37:00.000-07:00

I think I'll take up wardriving. Maybe I'll make a list of all wifi networks in my neighborhood. Who's with me?

I need more hobbies. Any suggestions?

Yes, this blog is becoming more of a "suggest what Chris does" game. Maybe if enough people contribute I can actually make it into a game. XD

MUSIC TIME.

2009-08-18T01:45:00.000-07:00

I'm going to refresh and renew my entire music collection. I was fairly overjoyed to find some Sonata Arctica and Veruca Salt's entire discography. Now's your chance, dear readers, to tell me what to listen to. Post a comment with your album/artist suggestions, and I'll give em a listen and see if I like it. =)

You know you want to. Even if you're one of those people who stumbled in here from Google Images.

Sleep is an elusive bitch.

2009-08-12T22:48:00.000-07:00

Soooo. There might be a reason why I'm always so bored and non-productive.

I CAN'T SLEEP. ><

Now, you might think, "Oh, well if you can't sleep that's just more time in the day to get things done!"

Not quite. Y'see, it's not that I don't sleep at all. I just can't make myslef sleep 'normal' hours. Oh, sure, I'm tired around midnight. I want to get to sleep. I try to get to sleep. But then my stupid mind betrays me and keeps me awake with random fragments of thought until I get so restless and bored that I have no choice but to leave my bed and wander about. I usually waste time until about 5 or 6 AM, at which point I can no longer remain conscious. Regardless of when I want to awaken, I usually end up regaining consciousness around 2 PM. By the time I've gotten into the rhythm of the day, everyone else is getting ready for bed. I love Greensburg, but the whole "Everyone closes up shop and goes to sleep when the sun sets" thing means that I have at most, 8 hours to my day, and that's if I start getting stuff done AS SOON AS I WAKE UP.

Joy.

Maybe I'll just stop bitching and take some sleeping pills or something, see if that resets me to a decent phase.

I'm a Mad Scientist. Or maybe just mad.

2009-08-08T21:53:00.000-07:00

So I was thinking...Jetpacks are awesome. I, of course, do not have one, nor do I have the materials to make one. However...what if I had a small engine (like from a lawnmower), modified to spin at a much-higher-than-normal speed? What if I then attached that to a fan or propeller of sorts, and wore it on my back? Would it be possible to make it spin fast enough to not only negate its own weight, but at least a large portion of the wearer's weight as well, basically making it a jump-pack? And if so, how likely would it be to lose stability and turn the wearer into a really long skidmark on the ground? I think I may try to explore these questions. Anyone with further insight, prior experience, or materials to volunteer, please comment!

...Nobody ever said I was perfectly sane.

More delay, status update.

2009-08-07T01:02:00.000-07:00

So, classes have been going pretty well. I need to work on my time-management a bit more, but things are getting done on time and it looks like I'll be able to pull good grades. My goal is to get my work done without needing to hurry, and still have time to write in my blog. I still really want to write more, but I always put it off until the thought either dissipates in my mind or is no longer relevant. This frustrates me. I've been reading a lot more, and hopefully by reading the works of others I will be able to better come up with a way to write what I want to say as well. Maybe I'll hit up goodreads.com and get some more suggestions from there.

Books I've been reading, with links to buy in case anyone's interested:

Emergency: This Book Will Save Your Life

Glenn Beck's Common Sense: The Case Against an Out-of-Control Government, Inspired by Thomas Paine

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: The Classic Regency Romance - Now with Ultraviolent Zombie Mayhem!

I'd summarize them here, but I'm terrible at book reviews. Besides, they've already been reviewed by other readers far better than I could manage. Plus, I'm kinda lazy. I'll work on that.

Still here..

2009-07-05T08:30:00.001-07:00

Sorry again for the lapse. There's been a lot of stuff going on, and I haven't felt very motivated to write much lately. I'm doing the school thing, with a twist--classes are online, and they start tomorrow. Sundays are Dungeons and Dragons night: at some point I'd like to DM a scenario of my own. Today I thought some more about what I'd like said scenario to be, and in the process ended up creating bits of a whole world in my mind. I'm thinking I'd like to write about it sometime. Maybe people'd buy the books. Tell me, internet: do you like adventures?

I'm still alive...

2009-06-16T11:15:00.000-07:00

but civilization is doomed.

Jobs In A Downer Economy

2009-04-30T10:05:00.000-07:00

That's right. Everyone's favorite veteran-turned-Interwebs-superhero is looking for a job. This, of course, is not an easy ride. Y'see, the combat pay isn't going to last me forever, and neither will unemployment. Plus, I feel a little dirty collecting handouts, even if it is about what I've lost to taxes in the past.

What can I say, I'm an honest sorta guy.

As you may have heard, the economy has fallen on hard times lately. This, of course, makes things tricky, especially for one such as myself who has no actual college degree, and little work experience aside from the military and a few various unskilled jobs. I'm not above working in fast food if that's what's required, but I'd really like to land something with more potential than that.

So, alas. I'll probably be looking at going back to school with my GI Bill. Or maybe we can all start a facebook group for irate victims of unemployment and turn it into something awesome.

Stay classy, internet.

Keep oot them Canucks, eh?

2009-04-22T09:10:00.000-07:00

So let's talk about the circus sideshow that is the Obama administration. Yes, let's. Normally I try to stay above the filth of personal political attacks, but I think we can all agree that Janet Napolitano is a douche bag.

The latest barrage of blatant idiocy and douchebaggery? Border security is important. With Canada. Pop that link open in a new tab. I'll wait for you to read it.

Done? Excellent.

Sure, it's important to defend our borders. It's a great idea to screen people coming in for terrorist ties. But really, is Canada such a rogue state that traffic over the border from there can be considered a serious threat? More so, than, oh, I don't know... Mexico?

When told that the rumors of 9/11 hijackers coming in from Canada were false, she offered this gem:

I can't talk to that. I can talk about the future. And here's the future. The future is we have borders.

To quote the internet: lolwut? And Bush was the buffoon? Fkn srsly?

Now it's true that people who wish to harm our country and its people can come in from anywhere, and most likely will choose the path of least resistance. But overall, I think a nearly failed state such as Mexico is easier to get through than Canada. And I'm not Director of Homeland Security, but overall, a rash of drug-related kidnappings and massive identity theft seems to be more of a threat than anything one of our closest allies and neighbors could present. It's not 1812 anymore, folks. Then again, Canada's probably considered a nation of dangerous right-wingers to these left-of-Lenin loonies.

The Tea Party

2009-04-16T11:48:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's local Tea Party in Greensburg was, in my opinion, a resounding success. I woke up a little late, since I was still sleepy from my late return from a funeral in Philadelphia the night before, but it was sort of a moot point as I didn't actually leave until about a half hour before the event's scheduled start time (noon) since I was waiting for the girlfriend, Sheri, to return from class.

So, rubbing sleep from my eyes, I shuffled to my car (Sheri was considerably bouncier than I was) and started off towards downtown Greensburg. We were still rolling down Pittsburgh Street, the courthouse barely in sight, when the first signs of just how big this event was going to be started showing. I had never seen traffic backed up like this. Up the hill we went, to courthouse at Otterman and Main Street, where Greensburg Police were directing traffic. From here, I could see that Courthouse Square was completely packed. There wasn't any parking left in the entire city, from what I could see, unless I wanted towed, so I drove up to Seton Hill University, Sheri's point of embarkation, and we walked all the way to the courthouse. Despite the drizzle, we all had a good time it appeared, the speeches were excellent (from what we could hear), and much cheering took place.

A few notes of concern:

The sound system was terribly underpowered, and people more than halfway back could hardly hear what was being said. I feel sorry for the folks across the street.
We have -GOT- to come up with something better to shout than "USA! USA!" I mean seriously. Besides, which USA are we cheering for, anyway? The old one guided by the Constitution, or the one that started to form about half a century ago and is now looking eerily like the next Soviet Union? Which brings me to my next point:
In Soviet Russia, slogans chant YOU!
I appreciated the honks of support by passing motorists. Still, there were a few assholes who insisted on driving around the block, leaning on their horns the whole way. It was a typical demonstration of the Left's leading debate tactic, namely, "If you can't defend your views, simply shut out the opposition." Very classy, guys.

And now for everyone's favorite, PICTURES!

Legend:

Picture taken as we approached the event on Otterman Street, from the west.
Our original vantage point, about halfway back.
A little closer to the tent, facing the other way towards Main Street.
I missed most of the introductions, but I'm going to guess this is Pastor Keith Tucci.
Signs of our times. There were some better ones but I couldn't get a good picture of them. Meh.
General Washington! Woohoo!

All in all, a great showing for the local defenders of liberty.

I Guess I'm An Extremist...

2009-04-15T00:20:00.000-07:00

According to the Department of Homeland Security, I'm a violent radical anti-American right-wing extremist. Isn't that grand.

That's right, the DHS has come out with a report on "Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment," which pretty much classifies anyone who disagrees with the Messiah as an enemy of the state. Let's see here....

Pro-life? Check.
Against unconstitutional federal power grabs? Check.
Against governmental meddling in private industry? Check.
Concerned about the loss of constitutional rights, including but not limited to, the First, Second, and Tenth Amendments? Check, check, check, and then some.
Supported third-party and small-government candidates like Ron Paul, Bob Barr, and the like? Chiggidy-check.
Recently returned veteran? Oh hells check.

Yep. Looks like I'm a right-wing extremist, and probably a white supremacist and anti-Semite as well.

So, I invite all my fellow right-wing extremists to attend their local ~~militia gathering~~ tea parties today and ~~kill some cops and minorities~~ show Big Government we aren't going to stand for their bullshit anymore. I'll be at the Greensburg, PA courthouse around noon, but there are plenty of these events taking place all over the country.

Happy Easter. (a few minutes late)

2009-04-12T21:32:00.000-07:00

So my original plan was to write a neat little post on Easter, maybe have a quick message, and share the story of the origins of Easter traditions and whatnot, gathered from many sources across the interwebs.

I ended up getting mildly sloshed at a gay bar and spending Easter hung over.

Oh well.

Stagnation OR Long Post Is LOOOOOOOOONG

2009-04-06T01:45:00.000-07:00

Yes. I realize I'm forming a pattern here.

I make a post implying that I'm getting back to blogging, and then disappear again as I've lost interest in blogging by the time anyone reads the post.

I can't guarantee this post will break the pattern.

Lately, I've been in a funk. I really need to find a direction, y'see. Quite frankly, I'm having trouble with that. My issue is that I have too many options. Sounds like a good thing, right?

Not entirely.

I'm able to do damn near anything I want. I know this. But when you have a vast field of options, all of which are interesting, things get somewhat complicated. You see, I'm not currently passionate about any of these choices enough to want to put aside any of the other possibilities. Hooray, an endless loop of indecision ensues. I really don't want this blog to be one of the myriad online diaries on the interwebs, but I have to get some things off my chest, and it's not like many people read this blog at this point in time, anyway. Yes, I know that's my fault. Stop judging me.

Maybe if I write out some of the choices I'll be able to get the wheels turning in my head. Or, maybe some kind soul can interest me in something enough to get me off my ass.

WRITING. Most eminent example: this blog. I often do have some ideas churning around in my head that I can write about, but usually by the time I get around to writing, it's no longer relevant. I've been told I'm quite skilled at the writing gig, and usually entertaining to read, but my big problem is content. What do I want to write about? Do I want to write about it enough to devote time to researching my subject so that I have something worth reading? I could take this blog in a lot of different directions, but in dedicating my time to writing about one subject, i could miss out on other subjects that could be equally fascinating. I certainly don't have the kind of life that'd make a personal experience blog interesting to anyone but my family and girlfriend, and I'm really not into writing about myself more than necessary, so that's out. Sure, I could have a bunch of posts about random things without doing much reading on any one subject, but it's not very interesting to write about, and unless I have a ton of interested readers to keep me motivated, I'll quickly lose interest again. Now, if I start blogging regularly about a subject I enjoy, I can likely get myself published in other venues, and possibly write a book. That would be very nice indeed. A writer's life may not always be the most profitable, but I can definitely see myself enjoying it.

COLLEGE: Damn near everyone wants me to go back to college, and really it's not a bad idea, even if I don't yet have full 100% GI Bill coverage to pay for it, since I'm okay with student loans if it's absolutely necessary. But this opens up yet another can o' worms set of choices. What do I want to study? I realize I can go to school with an undeclared major, but I don't want to. If I don't have something to work towards, I will lose my motivation, the quality of my work will decline, and I'll end up with another fiasco like in 2004, where I lost a full tuition scholarship and had to drop out. So what to do? I can go for computing again, assuming i can find a particular area of the field I want to specialize in. I'm fairly handy with computers, they both interest and enrage me, and i can make a decent buck if I go to that field. Definitely a possibility. Likewise, I can go for the natural sciences. These subjects fascinate the hell out of me, as anyone who knows me can tell that I love knowing all I can about how everything works. Chemistry, biology, physics, and the like are all wonderful fields for me to explore. Unfortunately, unless I plan to go to grad school, I might as well study literature as far as employability goes. Do I want to go to grad school? I really don't know yet. Do I want to put four years in at college and use up my GI Bill benefits to find out that I don't really want to work in my field of study? Not at all. Mathematics or engineering -- similar to computing. I could excel, or I could tire of it. At any rate, college will be a much bigger possibility if I get another deployment under my belt, so no frantic rush there.

HONE SKILLS: To bide time constructively until I can decide on how I want to make my way in the world, I can improve myself in quite a few ways. Right now I have marginal abilities in both computery things and music. I know enough to educate a layman somewhat, but not so much that I can do anything particularly impressive or profitable, aside from maybe cleaning viruses and crap from PCs and set up small home networks. Learning about networking, while fascinating, would require more money than i'm willing to spend on what might just end up being a hobby, so meh. Graphics? I don't consider myself skilled enough to compete with art school grads to do it professionally, and i don't have the inspiration to devote hours on making art for art's sake to hone said skills. It'd be fun, but it's low on the totem pole of probability. Coding is definitely a nice skill to have, both for personal utility and for the sake of employment. However, I'm an instant-gratification kinda guy. So, unless I can make something useful or interesting, there's no carrot on the end of my stick, and I always end up getting frustrated or lose interest in favor of something else before I'm knowledgeable enough to reach that point. I learn by doing, but I can't do unless I learn. Meh. Music's another of those things. I've tried to teach myself guitar and piano at various times, but I always get frustrated at my own mistakes, and I've nobody to help me when I have difficulties, so it always ends up being shelved. The girlfriend's expressed interest in helping me learn, so this is becoming more likely, as it'll become more interesting and less time-intensive. Not exactly career material, but I'm sure it'll be a hobby I enjoy, and that'll lift my spirits enough to help me down whichever path I may decide to take in the long run.

TRAVELLING: This is expensive if you plan to have a home base and a career, but not so much if you're a drifter who does nothing but travel. This of course would give me all the freedom I could ever want if I pull it off, but also has the potential to go terribly wrong. After all, you do need money to get to the next town, and without a home to return to, you're boned if, say, you run out of cash and the weather gets bad. There's such a fine line between "intrepid traveller" and "dirty hobo." Plus, if I tire of it, it'd be damn near impossible to get back on my feet to pursue another path. Alas, this idea will have to be relegated to the realms of fantasy, unless I manage to accrue enough wealth to mitigate the worst of the risks. Besides. The Army's got me by the balls until at -least- 2012.

Really, I'm leaning towards writing and working until I can make my fortune investing, but in all reality that's likely to be only slightly more profitable than the hobo path unless I seriously put balls to the wall (like, with staples). On the other hand, I'd have a lot of freedom once I could afford to put aside the daily grind (assuming I get to that point). I do so love the freedom.

So yeah. I'm about ready to let the dice decide. In the meantime, I'll keep myself ready in case a bloggable idea comes along, in which case I'll be able to post again. Of course, if anyone reading this has something you'd like me to share my insight on, let me know and I'll see what I can do. At the very least it'll get my creative juices flowing and perhaps help me find something I'd really like to write about regularly. If I write a book, maybe I'll dedicate it to you. Hee.

Much Overdue~

2009-01-23T00:38:00.001-08:00

So I realize I haven't been posting here much. By "much" I mean "at all." So, a brief synopsis.

I came home from Iraq, and spent a bunch of money at strip clubs and whatnot. Hooray.
I celebrated holidays with family. Fortunately, alcohol was served.
I ended up in one of those 'relationship' thingies. I then proceeded to do some stupid things which almost ended said relationship. EDIT: She was a lying sociopath. Pro tip, Internet folks: when a girl says she's a widow, ask for a death certificate.
I played a buttload of Final Fantasy XI, got the girlfriend playing, and spent many wonderful hours dying with my new Dynamis shell.
I contemplated moving to Singapore at some point in my life. Hey, it's like the second-freest economy in the world, and all their silly little bans are on things I don't do anyway.
Some other things.

I would be posting more, but seriously, I haven't had much motivation, and I can't come up with much interesting to say. So.. for the tiny little audience I might have for this blog, feel free to comment on what kinds of things you'd like to see here, and I'll try to deliver. If I find something I enjoy writing about, maybe you'll see more posts. Insha'allah.

GulfSat sucks balls.

2008-09-20T12:58:00.000-07:00

So here I am in Iraq, getting shitty internet for far more money than it's worth. The service is provided by (or at least the DNS servers are owned by) a company known as GulfSat.

Their DNS servers are really, horribly bad. A large percentage of sites I try to visit give me the "Server Not Found" error. There is no rhyme or reason to which sites are inaccessible, or when they are, for that matter. I imagine a typical request goes as follows:

My Computer: Hey, where's this server at?
DNS Server: *hic* Hell if I know.
My Computer: Well, um, can you look it up? That's kind of your job, after al--
DNS Server: FUCK YOU! YOU'RE NOT THE BOSS OF ME!

Thank the gods for Wireshark, SamSpade, and the hosts file. =/

New Site Arriving Sometime This Year!

2008-09-03T07:29:00.000-07:00

...maybe.

In an effort to kick-start myself into coding things For Great Justice and to save what's left of my brain cell, I have decided to start publishing some of the stuff I work on... I'll have a light content management system, possibly a couple games and such, perhaps blags for members, etc.

It's for now going to be hosted at karunkun.110mb.com. Unfortunately I've run into some problems getting MySQL and other features added, as when I tried to order the upgrades, they accused me of fraud and warned me not to try ordering from them again. I suppose, when my billing address is in the states, and my IP is in the middle east, that it appears suspicious, but we'll see if I can work this out with them, or whether I'll have to wait until I get home/find another hosting provider/get someone at home to do business for me.

Blar. More on this as it develops.

I spoke too soon..

2008-06-05T06:00:00.000-07:00

Disregard the rant that was here. Turns out they came through for me after all and everything is going according to plan. Time to kick some ass.

I still think 4ID's full of bollocks though.

Fnord 2: The Acapulco Golden Apple

2008-05-16T05:20:00.000-07:00

The universe is 5 minutes and 23 seconds old.

The fundamentalist Creationists claim that the universe was created in 4004 BC, and that all fossil evidence to the contrary was created to hide the true age of the world, and that only the Bible shows the truth. But let's take this a step further.

The universe is 5 minutes and 23 seconds old. Everything emerged from the Void exactly 5 minutes and 23 seconds ago, including your memories of anything happening before that, and only the people reading this blog know the Truth.

Hail Eris.
All Hail Discordia.

2 + 3 = 5.

Mystery Science Meat 2012

2008-04-23T15:26:00.000-07:00

First off, read about what seems like PETA doing something useful for a change instead of pissing people off with whining and whatnot.

Now. I think this'll have some serious implications. If this meat is biologically the same as the "real thing," then we could have us a more efficient way of producing delicious protein sources without having to sacrifice anything as a society. More personally for me, I won't have to feel that twinge of guilt when I eat meat and think of how some critter's whole life was spent being confined and fattened for slaughter--kind of a depressing thought, yes?

I may sound like a bit of a hippie here, but I do feel a bit of a kinship with my fellow animals, and nature in general. Now, as omnivores, it's perfectly natural to eat animals. Seriously...if we weren't meant to, they wouldn't be made of meat. I'm a lot more comfortable myself eating something that was killed fairly humanely after living a somewhat natural life. So I should probably take up hunting at some point.

But enough of the tangent. Aside from my hippie tendencies, this also appeals to my love of weird sciencey things. And this is about as weird and sciencey as I can find for some time.

Freely Creative

2008-04-18T05:22:00.000-07:00

So, I'm starting to feel creative again. Just a little. Messing around with the GIMP and twisting things. You know, like making Call of Duty feature my NCOIC; just little parodies and other amusing thingers. It's great fun. I'd share some here, but y'know. Some day, an overzealous lawyer will stumble upon my humble little blog and sue me for more money than I could ever hope to make over my entire life for using copyrighted material. It happens, you know. (But really, if you want to see it so bad, you can just ask. It's nothing special though)

Anyway, this brings me to another point. I've just finished reading Lawrence Lessig's Free Culture, and it's a great book. If you don't feel like paying for it (I plan on it, out of support) you can download it from the site for free. Here's an excerpt I yoinked into my AIM profile:

"Extremists in this debate love to say, “You wouldn’t go into Barnes & Noble and take a book off of the shelf without paying; why should it be any different with on-line music?”
The difference is, of course, that when you take a book from Barnes & Noble, it has one less book to sell. By contrast, when you take an MP3 from a computer network, there is not one less CD that can be sold. The physics of piracy of the intangible are different from the physics of piracy of the tangible."

No, he doesn't promote piracy (as some might assume from that small snippet); however, he does oppose the mindless corruption of copyright law to serve the interests of a small elite at the expense of culture itself. It's a good read, and informative too. If you missed the link earlier, it's at www.free-culture.cc

And I'd say that's enough rambling for today. It's orange outside. Stupid Iraqi dust.

Cigarette Thoughts

2008-04-08T16:05:00.000-07:00

You know.... I keep feeling I should feel different.. but I'm strangely comfortable here. mentally, that is.

I took a good look around and really considered my surroundings.

I'm surrounded by 18 foot high concrete blast walls. I'm in a foreign country thousands of miles from home, on the other side of the world. There are people who have never met me, yet who nevertheless want to kill me.

And yet... nothing feels different.

And that itself feels kind of strange.

And now I'm sounding like some kid on a Xanga. Bleh.

Fnord.

2008-03-05T10:43:00.000-08:00

So I was in the chow hall and I walked past the division commander. That's a two-star. As one might expect, aside from the rank, he was pretty much an average-looking oldish guy. Which got me thinking: We should totally make rank correlate with badassery, like in games. That way, you'd know he was in charge just by looking at the markings on his giagantic power armor suit. He'd need that power armor to lift his rapid-fire missile launcher. And he'd sit in a fortress next to the device that opened a portal right to General Petraeus' office. Which of course would be in a parallel dimension unreachable by normal means. That's how you'd get to the last(?) boss. I can't even imagine what he'd be packing but it'd have to be able to destroy worlds like Sephiroth's final form's special attack. Oh fuck yeah that'd be so sweet.

Yeah, I'd be nameless grunt #46087. The one you hit with the grenade back in level 4. =/

Meanie.

Netcrack

2008-03-02T13:49:00.000-08:00

So, my frequent readership of UF has inspired me to start playing NetHack, and boy is it ever addictive.

And boy do I suck. Those damn gnomey mines always pose trouble, but I always think to myself: "Oh, I'm sure I can survive this time." And, surprise surprise, I find myself wishing I had just skipped over. Then of course there was the double-pit surprise killing another attempt...and, well, let's just say it's brutal and I keep coming back for more.

You know you've been playing too much nethack when you look nervously down the corridor to your left and right, only to realize you're seeing your email address.

I'm going to get that fucking amulet. One day.

In somewhat related news, my plans for internet domination are hampered by the fact that I am no longer allowed to bring in my laptop to 'work.' This is because That Guy decided to plug his personal laptop into a government line, and now he has to have it wiped, and our section NCOIC decided to distribute the bullshit on everyone who isn't retarded. Fortunately, public dissent by people equal in rank to him will likely abolish this silly little directive within a day or so. JOI.

Brains...Melting...

2008-02-29T13:30:00.000-08:00

So. I've been in Iraq since mid-January. Yes, that's not the only reason I haven't been posting. But Iraq isn't the most intellectually stimulating place in the world, as army bullshit rots one's brain. And the decay is getting to me. So to combat this effect, I am installing a little apache platform, with some mysql and php, and yes, even some perl. I'll add python and ruby if sanity permits. Aaand of course, I'll be trying to learn Arabic, since it's all fucking around me.

Also, if anyone reading this wants me to code something for them as a project to keep me going and motivated during the downtime I sometimes get, let me know. I can't guarantee how often I'll work on it, but I assure you I will squeeze it into any free time I get, especially if you donate to my "Keep Chris From Living in a Box" fund.

Srsly. Combat pay's nice but it only goes so far.

Into the Looking Glass...

2007-06-27T08:56:00.000-07:00

So, I downloaded and installed the development release of Looking Glass.

Bear in mind, I'm at the low end of the system requirements, and it's not really even supposed to work reliably with my version of OpenGL (1.2, that is)

It looked pretty, but it shook a little. In addition, the mouse moved crawlingly. Then again, I was running it over my existing desktop environment, which had a terminal, instant messengers, and around 20 Firefox tabs up.

So my verdict so far-- it does look promising, but both it and my computer need a little work. After a few more updates and some tweaking on my end, I'm going to give it a more conclusive test, and maybe have some screenies to share. Everyone loves pictures, right?

Bells and Whistles and Shinies, Oh my!

2007-06-23T02:06:00.000-07:00

Okay, so.

First off, I certainly haven't been posting here as much as I'd like. In other words, not at all.

Secondly, there are things I have to say, so rejoice and drink in my all-encompassing wisdom. Or something.

Those who know me know full well that I rarely get excited about flashy graphical effects in desktop environments. In fact, I usually deride them every chance I get, as in the case of Vista, a terrible behemoth of memory-consuming excess that I will be unable to run on any of my current machines due to the requirements. You can buy me a new computer if you like, but I still won't be swayed. I hate those things.

That being said, I was reading in Linux Pro Magazine a little article that nonetheless made me squee with glee. -googles in search of a link- There we go. Project Looking Glass. Apparently a Sun developer was playing around with some 3D libraries in his spare time, and devised a little desktop environment thinger that uses 3d effects. HOWEVER: Don't confuse this with the kind of effects that make everything all pretty to the slack-jawed user populace and needlessly devour resources so your little worm-babies can marvel at the pretty colors.

This baby can organize windows in a mock-up of 3-d space, and it looks like you can reorient windows to take up less space. There's a panoramic view that you can move around to choose your workspace. Objects appear larger or smaller based on their position. You can write notes on the backs of windows! Gah-- so much fun! Yes, it does take up more resources than your standard Linux desktop environments (it also runs on Windows and Solaris, from what I read), but unlike SOME systems, I'd say this is a worthwhile expenditure. I might give it a try, and if I like it... well then I might snag me a little extra RAM to keep everything running smoothly.

So, maybe it's old news. Maybe I'm slow to report. Shut up and let me enjoy my damn computer.

Blogger.

2006-11-27T08:09:00.000-08:00

So I was googling my AIM screen name, when I came across a blogger account. How odd. I vaguely remember this. So I have revived it. Maybe. Let's see if I actually do anything with it.