| Thursday, May 15th, 2008
conservatism
[ heirtoruin ]
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10:00p
Tired of shrill cries of RACISM! and SEXISM! in the 2008 Presidential campaign... all aimed at conservatives and democrats not supporting the favored candidate of the opposition identity?
Tolerant and thoughtfully nuanced liberals across the Internet proudly proclaim their interest in diversity by creating a list of things younger than John McCain.
http://www.thingsyoungerthanmccain.com/
Re: SCRABBLE, What might very well be the world’s most boring game is actually younger than might very well be the countries most boring Senator...
I don't even need to make an argument.
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(7 comments | comment on this)
neworleans
[ docbrite ]
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8:17p
Getcha Carts Out Da Park
The following "official notice" was printed not very prominently in Section A of today's paper. It may be old news for all I know, but I know we have ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) marrus and some other Jackson Square artists here, and I wanted to bring it to their attention. After wading through the tortured syntax, I figure this is just another step in the city's apparent mission to make the lives of JS artists as difficult as possible.
NOTICE TO ALL EXISTING AND PREVIOUS JACKSON SQUARE ARTISTS
The French Market Coroporation (FMC) has issued this public notice to all existing and previous Jackson Square Artists who are storing artist carts on French Market property in Washington Artillery Park. This notice will serve as a thirty-day notice for all artists to remove their artist carts and their contents from Washington Artillery Park by Monday, June 9, 2008. The FMC will dispose of all unclaimed carts on june 10, 2008. Please direct questions to Patricia Henry, Deputy Director at 522-2621.
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(comment on this)
libertarianism
[ thedesertmouse ]
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6:03p
Milton Friedman in the news
Today the University of Chicago announced the creation of a Milton Friedman Institute; earlier this week Cato released a briefing demolishing the claims of Naomi Klein.
I say more about his on my vanity 'blog.
Thoughts on the concept of movement heroes/icons or anything else? Hitler was a bad man, why did it matter if he only had one ball? Why should it matter in American politics which of the Jefferson brothers had jungle fever? And just why is it an effective way of turning people off to liberalism, to claim falsely that Friedman loved disaster, suffering, and dictators?
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(4 comments | comment on this)
neworleans
[ docbrite ]
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6:55p
Missed Opportunity
Damn.
Stacy Head walked in front of my car today, not once but twice. Unfortunately, I was sitting in the parking lot of the St. Charles Walgreen's both times, and could not have run her down without driving up onto the sidewalk and doing serious damage to my front tires ... not to mention my freedom and liberty.
Still, it's a shame the things you see when your brakes aren't failing, causing your car to careen out of control through no fault of your own.
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(8 comments | comment on this)
neworleans
[ micahra ]
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6:24p
uu t f
Is anyone else having internets issues at the moment via COX Cable?
I though for a while I was shut off, but no....
I've got a really low power level on my signal (1 dBmV when it's usually 5 dBmV ) and I'm timing out constantly..
Grrrrr.
current mood: aggravated
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(6 comments | comment on this)
(71 comments | comment on this)
commonreader
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2:45p
Dear Dr. Internet
The baby is sleeping nice stretches, I'm cheerful and energetic (well, energetic for me anyway) - but I can't walk. My whole left leg and sacrum are one giant owie. I can hobble around if I don't put my left heel down, but I can't walk properly. WTF? Is this leftover malalignment from pregnancy? Did I whack my parts out during birth? Will it get better by itself or do I need to seek professional help?
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(4 comments | comment on this)
libertarianism
[ writerspleasure ]
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2:23p
CEO pay - the horrifying truth!
so how much payola do those rascally CEOs rake in? what's their cut of the pie? what's their take? their share of the loot? how much of the lotto-payout lands in their pockets? you can fill in the phraseology as you like - it's always the same: the money really belongs to the government and the poor workers and maybe some shareholders (if they're small and humble enough), but those upper-level parasites divert it and bleed the companies dry while contributing nothing but their pictures in the magazines. they make all us reg'lar folks suffer bad.
so how much is CEO pay as a percentage of revenue? the way we all hear about it, it must be gigantic - impovershing those workers and poor average stockholders all to heck. (kinda like how i've heard for decades that the military percentage of the u.s. federal budget is obscenely gigantic.)
well, comrades, behold. CEOs of U.S. companies :with median annual revenue of $66.2 billion ... [had] [m]edian total direct compensation of nearly $14 million.
... median revenue of $16.2 billion ... median total direct annual compensation of about $9.4 million.
median revenue of $3.2 billion ... median total direct compensation of $4.7 million. well, well.
largest company CEO pay: 0.0086% of revenue
bigger company CEO pay: 0.058% of revenue.
smaller company CEO pay: 0.147% of revenue
notice something else interesting? supposedly, greed and company-rape increases as one climbs the corporate success ladder, since the evil grows along with its root. yet CEOs at the larger companies show lower compensation as a percentage of revenue than at the smaller ones.
all this populist nationalize-their-wealth screaming over less than one-one-hundredth-of-one-percent of revenue!
oh, and how CEO pay only goes up-up-up? regardless of anything that happens?CEO compensation at the biggest U.S. corporations dropped sharply last year all of this can be found at:
- http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/WireStory?id=4860113&page=1
oh, and nota bene: "The tally does not include things such as the value of CEO perks or retirement benefits."
however, the really good part: "The pay tally includes an executive's base salary, annual cash bonus and the expected value of long-term incentives such as stock options and performance shares granted in the fiscal year covered by the proxy." - although those items are now expensed, they do not represent actual immediate cash hits to the company.
[ lightly x-posted ]
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(9 comments | comment on this)
conservatism
[ writerspleasure ]
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2:22p
CEO pay - the horrifying truth!
so how much payola do those rascally CEOs rake in? what's their cut of the pie? what's their take? their share of the loot? how much of the lotto-payout lands in their pockets? you can fill in the phraseology as you like - it's always the same: the money really belongs to the government and the poor workers and maybe some shareholders (if they're small and humble enough), but those upper-level parasites divert it and bleed the companies dry while contributing nothing but their pictures in the magazines. they make all us reg'lar folks suffer bad.
so how much is CEO pay as a percentage of revenue? the way we all hear about it, it must be gigantic - impovershing those workers and poor average stockholders all to heck. (kinda like how i've heard for decades that the military percentage of the u.s. federal budget is obscenely gigantic.)
well, comrades, behold. CEOs of U.S. companies :with median annual revenue of $66.2 billion ... [had] [m]edian total direct compensation of nearly $14 million.
... median revenue of $16.2 billion ... median total direct annual compensation of about $9.4 million.
median revenue of $3.2 billion ... median total direct compensation of $4.7 million. well, well.
largest company CEO pay: 0.0086% of revenue
bigger company CEO pay: 0.058% of revenue.
smaller company CEO pay: 0.147% of revenue
notice something else interesting? supposedly, greed and company-rape increases as one climbs the corporate success ladder, since the evil grows along with its root. yet CEOs at the larger companies show lower compensation as a percentage of revenue than at the smaller ones.
all this populist nationalize-their-wealth screaming over less than one-one-hundredth-of-one-percent of revenue!
oh, and how CEO pay only goes up-up-up? regardless of anything that happens?CEO compensation at the biggest U.S. corporations dropped sharply last year all of this can be found at:
- http://abcnews.go.com/Business/Economy/WireStory?id=4860113&page=1
oh, and nota bene: "The tally does not include things such as the value of CEO perks or retirement benefits."
however, the really good part: "The pay tally includes an executive's base salary, annual cash bonus and the expected value of long-term incentives such as stock options and performance shares granted in the fiscal year covered by the proxy." - although those items are now expensed, they do not represent actual immediate cash hits to the company.
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(32 comments | comment on this)
phanatic
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4:03p
Remember that mom who thrust herself into the middle of some teen drama and helped drive a young girl to suicide?
They just indicted the bitch.
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(18 comments | comment on this)
ikilled007
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11:01p
I Love Bootlegging Internet
I am at the beach at 11pm chilling with some wine and bootlegging internet. Life is great.
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(1 comment | comment on this)
madbard
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1:55p
Review: Latest Amoeba impulse-buy
After listening to much of a CD of tuba and piano pieces, I've concluded that I really like many of them. Except for the parts where the tuba plays.
Also, how long do you think it'll be before we start to see Gay Divorce Court and other reality shows leaping to exploit the newly legalized same-sex-marriage convention in California? Not long, I am guessing.
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(17 comments | comment on this)
boffo
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1:51p
Missing
Lately electricia and I have been playing the game Missing, also known as Missing: Since January, Missing: The 13th Victim, and In Memoriam. (I don't know why it has four different titles.) We're having a lot of fun with it.
(Also, I want to throw out some thanks to mclaw666 for sending it to us.)
The premise of the game is that this reporter and his friend disappeared while investigating some sort of mysterious cult and serial killer. Then the network the reporter worked for received an encrypted CD from the killer. To help find their missing reporter, they copied the disc and are redistributing it to anyone willing to help. In the game play, you have to solve various puzzles, and each time you do it will show you either some footage that the reporter shot or a message from the killer.
But what's really neat about it is that incorporates elements of an Alternate Reality Game in it. The producers to the game set up a bunch of fake websites that you'll have to look at to find necessary elements to solving the puzzles in the game. So you can read one of the victims' online diary, or check out the website of the cemetery where one of the murders took place, or find old articles from fake newspapers describing a murder from twenty years ago. None of these websites have anything to clearly identify them as being fake or associated with the game. You also get periodic e-mails purportedly from the network, other people trying to decrypt the disc, and eventually from the killer himself. (In reality these e-mails are obviously auto-generated when you reach certain milestones in the game.)
I'm really enjoying it. The external websites and e-mails help build the sense that the events are happening in the larger world rather just inside your PC. And the puzzles themselves are pretty good. Generally there will be a picture or animation, and some sort of cryptic statement from the killer. You have to figure out what to google, find the right website, and figure out the right name/location/date to enter to solve the puzzle. Sometimes you also have to figure out *how* to enter information, as it won't have a simple text box.
The puzzles are actually quite similar to those of The Stone. But I like Missing a lot more, because the puzzles are mostly at just the right degree of difficulty. It usually takes active thought and a bit of work looking through the websites and e-mails to solve a puzzle, but it's something we can do in 15 minutes to a half-hour. They aren't perfect - sometimes we'll solve it in two minutes, and sometimes we have to consult a spoiler site for a hint. But most of the puzzles are just right. By contrast, the puzzles of The Stone were frustratingly difficult at best, requiring hours of research and guesswork. And many of the later puzzles of The Stone became outright arbitrary and impossible to solve without reading spoilers.
To sum up, I recommend this game to puzzle fans, and am excited to play more of it. I'm sure we'll also pick up the sequel when we finish.
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(2 comments | comment on this)
neworleans
[ vvoelker ]
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2:41p
Help Creating Your Emergency Preparedness Plan
The Allstate foundation has paired up with One Economy to launch an initative to place emergency preparedness information directly into the hands of New Orleans residents. They announced their community outreach plan this past Tuesday, May 14 during a block party at the Hope Community Credit Union in Central City. The launch party was a huge success with food, music, sno-balls and cotton candy. Even the children at Clear Head Learning Center joined in the fun with a dance to the hokey pokey. They were absolutely adorable.This is going to be an important program to protect the lives of our family and friends in the case of an emergency. Allstate and One Economy plan to achieve their goal of giving each resident the necessary resources to form a personal emergency plan by offering their personal services. They are offering to speak to organizations and church groups, train businesses how to protect their clients in the case of an emergency and hold public events educating people about emergencies. The best part of the plan is that Allstate and Economy One are sending fellow organizations out into the communities to help people personally create their own emergency response. Ultimately, they plan to be involved with 20 local non-profits and assist 100,000 people. They have also created an online resource www.thebeehive.org/beprepared that helps families plan for all kinds of emergencies from natural disasters to diseases. To take advantage of this awesome program, e-mail communityfellowsinfo@one-economy.com and someone will respond to help you create a personal emergency plan. I just wanted to share this valuable resource. I know I’ll be e-mailing them.
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(1 comment | comment on this)
elligirl
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3:39p
Educational video about the American News Media
Ever wondered how much of the American News is actually covering international stories? Now you know!
current mood:  busy
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(2 comments | comment on this)
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