Anthropomorphic Personifications

a place for thoughts or a lack thereof

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Thursday, May 22, 2008

Justice Clinton?

Democracy in America once again has a link to another good idea.

It would get her out of the way but still let her have something desirable enough to save face. It might be a slap in the face to some republicans but, well, they've never been all that concerned about what moderates and democrats might think about their Supreme Court Nominees... at least as far as I know.

Better than having her on the ticket in any case.

Tuesday, May 13, 2008

I'm now a spam originator ... Apparently

So apparently there is now a spam bot(net) out there (at 88.232.98.61, 92.81.250.109, among others) that has harvested my work email as a sender address.
This means that I'm getting about 2 or 3 bounce messages per hour telling me that "the addresses was unreachable" and that "our bulk email filter has rejected you email" etc. Lucky for me I seem to be mostly selling watches.

But I'm pretty frustrated because there doesn't seem to be a solution and if this goes on for much longer my address (and/or company domain) is going to make it onto some official spam black lists... which will prevent me from getting (real) emails to any one.
Bah!

Does any one have any ideas? I personally think I'm just screwed. I just wish I knew where they're harvested my address from. I don't even get that much spam normally, I'm pretty defensive about where I give it out.
<sigh>

Muslim Opinion

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/05/12/opinion/12luttwak.html
As the son of the Muslim father, Senator Obama was born a Muslim under Muslim law as it is universally understood. It makes no difference that, as Senator Obama has written, his father said he renounced his religion. Likewise, under Muslim law based on the Koran his mother's Christian background is irrelevant.
His conversion, however, was a crime in Muslim eyes; it is "irtidad" or "ridda," usually translated from the Arabic as "apostasy," but with connotations of rebellion and treason. Indeed, it is the worst of all crimes that a Muslim can commit, worse than murder (which the victim's family may choose to forgive).
Not something that I'd seen explained before. Certainly it could complicate things... but...

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Monday, May 12, 2008

Political Fakery

http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=11332230
His leadership defects were especially exposed during the hinge of his premiership thus far: the weeks last autumn when he considered holding a general election. The game-playing exposed Mr Brown's efforts to appear ecumenical—the great Tory-hater taking tea with Lady Thatcher, for instance—as so much cynical manipulation. Worst of all was his behaviour after he pulled back. He first comically denied that opinion polls had affected his decision, then over-hastily emulated a crowd-pleasing Tory tax proposal, leaving an enduring impression of intellectual surrender.
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200805/clintons-youtube
Just replace Mr. Brown in the above paragraph with Mrs. Clinton and fix the situational details and then you've about got it.

Two different stories about two different politicians, suffering from (among many problems they each have) the same basic problem. Lack of authenticity.

Which only leaves the question: Are other politicians just better at faking it?


PS-I've been reminded that I'm cross posting this site on Facebook... Which I find rather hilarious since it means that I come across as way more political than I am. The reality is that I spend more time than I probably should reading about the election and don't have many people to talk about it with so it gets vented here. And this blog wins because it lets me email posts in which means I can do it from work (shhhh!) when I'm busy procrastinating rather than at home when I'm busy relaxing.

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Monday, May 05, 2008

Why I like Obama: Today's edition

It's not quite a puff piece, although I suppose that I could understand how it might be seen as such.
It is however the most eloquent explanation of why I think Barack is the most appealing person in politics.
It's not far different from what I've said before, just that he is willing to adhere to his morality even when it may not be the most politically expedient thing to do.

Favourite bits:
It's just that what Obama is trying to hold himself above isn't moral imperfection but moral pretense, which can be confusing at a time when politics is all about shot-and-a-beer charades and flags-of-our-father's puffery.

Clinton and her husband long ago cultivated an image of themselves as tenacious warriors willing to meet the enemy with inexhaustible ferocity. But it's become clear to many of their former supporters during this campaign that their enemy isn't who we thought it was, that it is in fact anyone and anything that gets in the way of The Clintons.

Yet Reverend Wright, who has been completely shut out of the Obama campaign from the beginning, is still a hot-button issue and somehow Mark Penn, still employed by the Clinton campaign, is not. Obama seems genuinely troubled by Wright's words, and the course their relationship has taken, while Clinton only seems bothered by Penn's clumsiness.

Yet she has accused Obama of not being able to "take the heat," because he pointed out the lack of substance in recent debate questions.
Oh to hell with it. Just read the article.

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Thursday, May 01, 2008

The ongoing race

I'm supposed to be doing other things today (as ever), but I saw this comment (which the poster admittedly lifted from somewhere else) and I rather liked it:
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/05/polls_hint_at_c.html#c090241

And I really do think that the "elitist" label that has been applied to Obama is bullshit. He's certainly less wealthy than his competitors, has demonstrated (as a community organizer) that he's willing and eager to use the skills (education) that he has gained (presumably through hard work) to help those who have perhaps not had the same opportunities.

If anything it seem to me that it's more of an urban/rural divide than an elite/the rest of us divide. I really am not convinced that either Hillary or John has any more claim to be a part of rural America, they are perhaps just much more practiced at faking it. And, I would argue, Barak has more credibility with respect to learning the issues and finding people who understand them and then working to lay the groundwork to actually make peoples lives better. This in contrast to the populist pandering of the other two as in the case of the gas tax holiday plan which I just can't see how it would help anyone except the oil companies. (and, it seems, politicians.)

Which leads to one last thing: Barak Obama has shown that he is willing to say "I made a mistake. Now we're going to fix it." The examples are legion but since I've already broached the gas tax holiday, let's start with that. He supported a similar program in Illinois. It didn't really work the way it was intended to. Now, having learned from that, he opposes the plan supported by McCain and Clinton. Likewise, for this whole preacher-gate thing. He gave his long time friend the benefit of the doubt, but once Wright continued to say these things (which even once they were put in context still felt crafted to create strife rather than seek solutions), in some respect violating the trust that Obama had in him, then Obama stepped up again and said that he perhaps should have spoken out more forcefully.

This flexibility and ability to admit "Whoa! That didn't work quite the way we expected. Let's not just keep going with the same approach, hoping that more of the same will somehow produce a different result. Instead, let's stop what we are doing and use what we have learned to try to get to the end result that we want." Which, I just want to make clear is exactly what I feel the Bush administration has failed to do over and over again.
(Yes, I also like Obama's preference for the collective first person plural."

I could probably keep going.. and I'm sure I had a few other thoughts that got sidelined but... As I said... other things to do.
--
It's like chemistry, I do it to get a reaction.

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