Zoute Boel

Komen pressured to drop Planned Parenthood

2012-02-01T13:54:00.000-08:00

Yet another organization deciding that Planned Parenthood is bad and shouldn't get any funding (search link). The Susan G. Komen for the Cure foundation abruptly dropped funding for Planned Parenthood after only recently praising the breast health programs of Planned Parenthood. The quoted reason for dropping funding: one political Representative is conducting an inquiry into Planned Parenthood. The most likely reason: pressure from anti abortion, right wing and religious groups.

When are these organizations realizing that education and guidance is a good thing and sorely needed. How else are people going to get information and help with planned parenthood? From the Web? Planned Parenthood is for everybody of all ages who need help.

Howard Milano

Now Apple is "not" doing evil

2012-02-01T07:05:00.000-08:00

Apple is in trouble again about the factories it uses to make its products. Apple CEO Cook said: "We care about every worker in our worldwide supply chain. Any accident is deeply troubling, and any issue with working conditions is cause for concern," Yet when Apple released a report on its factories overseas: "it revealed that a staggering 62% of the 229 facilities that it was involved with were not in compliance with Apple's 60-hour maximum working week policy. Almost a third had problem with hazardous waste."

So those shiny Apple products are made in the worker hell pits overseas. I find it funny that Cook thinks working condition problems in 62% of its factories is only "a cause for concern." Easy for him to say from his corner office with excellent working conditions.

Howard Milano

Santorum not for president

2012-01-06T20:13:00.000-08:00

Rick Santorum, who is a Presidential contender, has some laughable beliefs, or should I say scary beliefs? He wants to bring back "don't ask, don't tell" in the military, and he opposes birth control (" It’s a license to do things in a sexual realm that is counter to how things are supposed to be") among other things (such as opposing gay marriage).

Please, Santorum, birth control is extremely useful, it protects against diseases and unwanted pregnancies. Opposing birth control is like wanting to back to the Stone Age. Even the Pope is changing his mind about birth control. It's a good thing, birth control.

Bringing back "don't ask, don't tell" is about the most stupid idea I've heard in a long time. Santorum, the cat is out of the bag. It's well know who is gay or not gay by now. Turning back the clock is going to be extremely awkward for all soldiers.

Anyway, Santorum, why are you so against gays? Most people by now are tolerant of gays. Leave them alone, they are people just like you and me, they just have a different sexual liking.

Santorum being President would be extremely scary.

Howard Milano

Gingrich pledges fidelity

2011-12-12T19:23:00.000-08:00

Newt Gingrich, yes the one with 2 divorces, 3 marriages and at least one extramarital affair, has sent a public letter to the Family Leader group pledging to : "uphold the institution of marriage throughpersonal fidelity to my spouse and respect for the marital bondsof others." Why would we believe anything Newt says? He insisted on discussing divorce while his first wife was in the hospital. He divorced his second wife after she got a diagnosis of multiple sclerosis. He had an extramarital affair while he pushed for the impeachment of Bill Clinton. He got fined and reprimanded by the House ethics committee. He accused Democrat lawmakers of writing bad checks while he himself wrote bad checks. Newt, who is in the lead for the Republican contender for President, seems to be mostly interested in his own well-being. I don't understand why anybody would vote for him.

Howard Milano

Herman Cain supports woman and doesn't tell his wife

2011-12-03T11:04:00.001-08:00

Herman Cain gave up his efforts to become the next US president. What a mess he created, he seems to have skeletons in his closet and he tried hard to discredit anybody who discovered any of those skeletons. I don't think we'll ever know the truth about Cain's skeletons, I mean Cain is just like any other public figure willing to lie about everything.

What we do know is what he admitted, and the last piece I learned was that he admitted he actually gave money regularly to his 'friend' Ginger White. This because he's such a soft hearted person! And then he admitted he never told his wife!! When is the last time you regularly gave money away to 'friends' because you have such a soft heart and not told your spouse? I know, never, it's simply not what people do unless there's something fishy going on such as hiding a sexual relation (read being blackmailed).

Howard Milano

No more virgins in Saudi Arabia in 10 years!

2011-12-02T20:08:00.001-08:00

According to scholars in Saudi Arabia "Allowing women to drive in Saudi Arabia would cause rampant sex, porn and homosexuality.", and "Within 10 years of the ban being lifted, the report claimed, there would be "no more virgins" in the country."

I'm having a difficult time understanding how anybody could say things like this, and these people call themselves 'scholars', implying they think they have a good measure of intelligence. These people show a complete lack of compassion, understanding of women, and understanding of what they're actually saying.

Howard Milano

Facebook is for smarter people, yeah right

2011-10-19T20:20:00.000-07:00

Do a search for "Facebook gray matter" and you'll probably run into the story of the ground-breaking discovery that Facebook users with more friends have more gray matter and thus smarter! This is a typical example of stupid research. Let's see, the sample size is 125 college students, a fairly small sample considering there are what some 800 million active Facebook users, and the vast majority of Facebook users are not college students. The articles mention there is 'a tie' between 'more friends' and 'more gray matter', with no details of that tie, but the actual research says "Taken together, our findings demonstrate that the size of an individual's online social network is closely linked to focal brain structure implicated in social cognition.". Well duh, if you're more social, your social brain areas are bigger...

I can believe that if you are more social and have lots of friends, you likely have lots of Facebook friends as well. But smarter means more social, and more social means smarter? That's just a bit hard to believe.

Howard Milano

Republicans out of touch with reality

2011-07-30T10:53:00.000-07:00

As the US government continues its soap opera trying to deal with the debt ceiling crisis, there was a short blurb in a CNN article (http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/07/30/debt.talks/):

"A recent CNN/ORC International Poll reveals a growing public exasperation and demand for compromise. Sixty-four percent of respondents to a July 18-20 survey preferred a deal with a mix of spending cuts and tax increases. Only 34% preferred a debt reduction plan based solely on spending reductions."

Now that is revealing. The one thing we all know is that Republicans all object to any tax increase, and this stand is a major factor contributing to the failed debt ceiling negotiations. So the Republicans are clearly not in line with current opinion. This means increased dissatisfaction with Republicans which won't help them in any future election.

Howard Milano

Tea Party has no clue

2011-07-27T19:45:00.000-07:00

Here is the latest headline from the debt ceiling debate: "Tea Party Activists Revolt Against Boehner Amid Debt Crisis". The Tea Party gained votes last election because some voters were looking for something a bit more conservative. Well, I wonder if those same voters are still so happy with the Tea Party. All the Tea Party does is complain, stop any progress, and attack their fellow Republicans. Let's see, Democrats don't like the Tea Party, many Republicans don't like the Tea Party (especially the ones being attacked), I don't like the Tea Party. That leaves not many Tea Party supporters outside the Tea Party itself. It looks like the Tea Party is hard at work making itself obsolete, and that after such a short time of existence!

Howard Milano

Sarah Palin rant

2011-07-26T21:29:00.000-07:00

I'm really starting to hate Sarah Palin. All she does is attack President Obama. Here is a recap of today's news about her: "Sarah Palin on Debt Debate: More Obama Drama", "Sarah Palin says Obama's ideas 'are the antithesis' of the forefathers", "Palin: Obama "Getting Pretty Good At Fear Mongering". It seems ALL she can do is attack Obama, she has nothing good to say about him. Did I say already I hate Sarah Palin?

Howard Milano

Debt negotiation soap opera

2011-07-23T19:47:00.000-07:00

The Republicans and Democrats are making a soap opera about the debt negotiations. I don't get it. What is the problem? A nation in debt raises taxes and decreases spending which together makes the debt go down quickly. After the debt becomes manageable (which it isn't right now), taxes can be lowered and spending increased if necessary. The Republicans don't understand this, they have this self imposed vow of never raising taxes, and their idea of cutting spending is to raid the poor, the old, and the young. Their most brilliant plan was to discontinue Medicare and give senior citizens vouchers for health care (Some 85% of Americans don't want Medicare touched). Democrats seem to be a bunch of lame ducks. Both sides have stormed out of the negotiations. Anyway, they don't have any choice, next week they'll forge a deal, the stock market will surge for a few days (make sure to jump aboard), and the US will keep piling on the debt.

Howard Milano

Steve Jobs hates Flash

2011-07-21T22:59:00.000-07:00

The following straight from Steve Jobs' article http://www.apple.com/hotnews/thoughts-on-flash/:

"Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system.
Apple has many proprietary products too. Though the operating system for the iPhone, iPod and iPad is proprietary, we strongly believe that all standards pertaining to the web should be open."

Right Steve. You have a closed 100% proprietary hardware and OS, and you shut out Adobe claiming all standards should be open. I call that hypocrisy.

OS X Lion, the new Mac OS just came out and Flash doesn't work at all anymore, causing lots of troubles for users such as running the CPU at 100% (hardware acceleration is now disabled for Flash), hanging machines (Flash takes a long time to quit), and more. Well, it's all Adobe's fault according to Steve.

Thanks Steve, good Jobs!

Howard Milano

Al-qaeda defeat, see it to believe it

2011-07-09T19:56:00.000-07:00

Leon Panetta said that Al-Qaeda defeat is within reach of the US. Yeah right. That's the same as what the US has been saying for decades about the war on drugs, which we're supposedly almost winning every year! There are some wars that can't be won. Al-Qaeda is spread out and while it's beaten down I don't see any progress towards eliminating it, and how could we eliminate it anyway. It's in all kinds of places where we have little control, like Yemen and Pakistan, and soon we'll be out of Afghanistan. Al-Qaeda won't rest till the US stops messing with every single country in the world.

Howard Milano

High unemployment explained

2011-07-08T20:06:00.000-07:00

Unemployment went up again to 9.2%. There are really good reasons for this high level of unemployment, and a major one is that companies in the USA have off-shored any job they can in the last 10 to 20 years. Businesses are so short sighted. They figure they can create their goods anywhere else in the world as long as it's cheaper to make abroad and ship it back here. And then what? That's the part these businesses forget. If you get rid of your workers in the USA, who is going to buy your goods even if they are cheaper? This is biting us right now in the USA. Hopefully the tide will turn and manufacturing and other businesses come back to the USA. If the unemployment stays high, the economy in the USA will not recover.

Howard Milano

WeinerGate or is it WienerGate

2011-06-06T21:50:00.000-07:00

What is it with all these horny politicians? We've had dozens of politicians, many Republicans but also Democrats, who show a complete lack of brains and common sense and an abundance of horny hormones. Now we have Rep. Anthony Weiner D-NY who posts a picture of his man hood in underwear, then lies about, and finally tearfully admits it was him after all, and he is sorry, and, get this, he is not going to resign!

I have no problems with the explicit picture, Weiner has freedom of expression even if he wants to kill his marriage, his political career, and his life. Yes, Weiner shows he is a horny idiot, but so what. What is really disgusting in my eyes is that he lies, and after he gets caught he doesn't want to take responsibility for his lies and resign.

You do something wrong, you take responsibility as much as you can. Don't be a wiener Weiner!

Howard Milano

The redesign of Google's News site sucks

2010-07-05T12:33:00.000-07:00

Google has redesigned their flagship News site, http://news.google.com. Claiming they field tested the new design and tweaked it till most testers liked, they now (early July 2010) rolled it out (read force fed it) to all readers. I was a regular reader of Google news, adjusting the sections and number of stories to my exact liking. Now I need to specify 'more' for the number of stories, and 'sometimes' for a section, and then I have to wait and see what happens. The two column design is gone, changed to a single column design that makes me scroll down forever. There is a mouse rollover, which shifts the screen contents continuously in a distracting way. There are sections I can't remove such as the FIFA World Cup results.

There are numerous complaints on the help forum, but the only Google answer is that they have no intention to switch back to the old design. Apparently the reasoning is that only the most vocal disgruntled people react on the forum, and everybody else loves it, so why worry about a few complainers.

On the positive side, the Flip section works much better now that it is on the side and only shows one page at a time.

Suggestions for improvement:
- Bring back the two column design, which makes more visible in less space, especially on large monitors
- Let people specify the exact number of topics in each section, say 5 or 10, not 'more'.
- Make all sections optional, such as the FIFA World Cup results, and allow for more such sections such as Wimbledon.
- Give people a chance to keep using the old design for some time. Don't force feed changes.
- ULTIMATE SOLUTION: port the WYSIWYG engine of Blogger to Google News so people can tailor the page to their liking

Howard Milano

Palin Not for President!

2009-07-06T20:22:00.000-07:00

Alaska Governor (still) Sarah Palin announced her resignation 18 months before her term ends. I think that's fine. One quote mentioned that "... off-color jokes by talk-show host David Letterman contributed to her decision to step down, Palin's attorney said Monday". I even think that's fine. However, if she decides to enter the Presidential race in 2012, I think that's not fine anymore. Palin mentioned a 'higher calling' as one of her reasons to resign, and I'm just a bit afraid she refers to the U.S. Presidency as that higher calling. I can't imagine any sane person voting for somebody who's a quitter and on top of that can't handle a joke from Letterman. However, many people voted twice for Bush (the shrub), so what do I know.

Howard Milano

The Catholic Church hates Obama

2008-11-13T18:44:00.000-08:00

I have never had a high opinion of the Catholic Church, and I am happy to see my low opinion justified yet again. Some Catholic priest refuses to give communion to Obama supporters, and the Catholic Bishops are fighting Obama over abortion rights. It seems that nobody has heard of separation of Church and State, and Catholics are happily condemning anybody who is not as holy as the Pope. I wished people would understand the true purpose of religion, which is the pursuit of study, contemplation and spirituality. Instead, for many people the main purpose of religion seems to be the pursuit of hatred and contempt towards everybody who shows some kind of 'fault'. True religion is oriented inwards, not outwards.

Howard Milano

Gay marriage

2008-11-06T22:35:00.000-08:00

It's sad to see that voters in California and Arizona passed amendments to the constitution to define a marriage to be only valid if it's between a man and a woman. This is a typical example of a majority suppressing a minority. Many of these voters are probably religious, and their religion teaches them to treat others like they would want to be treated themselves. Yet these same people hear 'gay' or 'lesbian' and they go out of their way to treat others NOT like they want to be treated themselves. I'm not gay myself, but at least I have the decency to treat others well. If gays and lesbians want to get married, please go right ahead. You have my blessing.

Howard Milano

Soon we will be able to phone on planes

2008-08-08T08:38:00.000-07:00

Despite the fact that the government wants to extend the ban on cell phone use in planes, there is at the same time a push from airlines to offer wireless service for computers in planes. Well, guess what, wireless access for computers means phone access through your computer, there are lots of voice over IP programs people can use. Yes, your computer might be a bulky phone to bring on your trip, but at least you can tell your family and friends how fun it is to be flying! Then there will be people gaming on their computers using their headset to communicate with other gamers. Soon it will be time to invest in noise canceling headphones.

Howard Milano

One more achievement for Bush

2008-07-28T19:06:00.000-07:00

I guess President Bush wanted to do one more "notable" deed before leaving office. He approved the execution of a private, convicted for rapes and murders, who has been on military death row since 1988. Bush is the first president in 51 years who approves a military execution, I guess Bush really wanted to make his mark here. He could easily commute the sentence to life long imprisonment, which I think is a worse sentence, but instead he went with the execution. Bush approved about 150 executions in Texas when he was governor there, so he obviously has zero qualms about executing people. Bush has a very low approval rating in the polls, somewhere in the high 20%; I don't think this latest deed will make his approval rates go up.

Howard Milano

Torture is okay!

2008-07-24T20:36:00.000-07:00

From an article of The Associated Press: "The Justice Department in 2002 told the CIA that its interrogators would be safe from prosecution for violations of anti-torture laws if they believed 'in good faith' that harsh techniques used to break the will of prisoners, including waterboarding, would not cause 'prolonged mental harm.'". This to me typifies the whole (younger) Bush government. Torture is not torture if the person being tortured recovers mentally in the long run! Forget about any harm to their body, forget about any pain, now or forever. Anything goes as long as the prisoner does not end up in a crazy house for a long time! Even better if they die during torture, since the prisoner can't have 'prolonged mental harm'! Anyway, this is pretty disgusting behavior of the good old U.S. of A.

Howard Milano

Arctic Oil

2008-07-23T20:06:00.000-07:00

Now that it become more likely that countries will start drilling in the Arctic, I was surprised to learn that the total oil output of Arctic drilling is only about 90 billion barrels, enough for a paltry 3 years of world demand. Yes, that's where we are now in the world. We're considering invading and polluting a majestic nature reserve, the Arctic, and all that for 3 years of driving our cars. And it's not that it's just 3 years of drilling, I would sort of be fine with that. No, it's probably 30 years of messy drilling. By the time they're done it'll be the black Arctic or the oily Arctic. I hope everybody is considering buying a hybrid or electric car as their next car because the world has to wean itself off the oil habit. And start working remote from home if there's any way you can.

Howard Milano

Batman, The Dark Knight

2008-07-21T21:57:00.000-07:00

The Batman, The Dark Knight movie came out and lots of people went to see it. That's all fine since I think it probably is a great movie (will know more when I see it). Here is what I don't get: tickets for the Dark Knight movie were sold on eBay for around $50, with buyers bidding around $40 and sellers asking for around $60. In this time and age when people are complaining about $4/gallon gas and record grocery bills, those same people are grossly overpaying for a cinema ticket in a theater that is guaranteed absolutely overcrowded, meaning you'll be sitting in the very front or next to the wall unless you stand in line for hours. Wait a few weeks and you'll be able to catch that same movie for half price in the matinee and you'll still see it on the biggest screen with no waiting line and plenty of room to pick a good seat.

Howard Milano

George W. Bush Sewage Plant

2008-07-17T23:39:00.000-07:00

San Francisco voters get a chance to vote for the new name of a sewage plant: the George W. Bush Sewage Plant. I think it has a nice ring to it. The San Francisco Republican Party thinks otherwise, the White House has no comment. It appears that the measure might easily pass. In 2006 58% of the voters supported a local initiative to impeach Bush and Cheney.

Howard Milano

High school dropout rate

2008-07-16T20:28:00.000-07:00

Disturbing news from California. Almost 1 out of 4 high school students dropped out before graduating. For Black students the percentage is 41.6, for Latino students it's 30.3, for White students it's 15.2, and for Asian students it's 10.2. I can understand that some people don't want to go to college and rather start a business or learn a trade, but high school is where you learn basic skills such as reading (and comprehending), writing (intelligently), and math, science, languages, etc. The majority of people who don't finish high school have very little chance to succeed in life simply because they don't know much. Yes, school can be hard and time consuming, but it's one of the best investments a person can make. If you talk to anybody who dropped out of high school, show them the alternatives such as online study and passing the GED.

Howard Milano

Tasteless cartoon

2008-07-16T07:53:00.000-07:00

The New Yorker magazine has pulled a stunt that takes tastelessness to new heights. They put a cartoon on their cover that depicts Barack Obama in traditional Muslim gear, with his wife dressed up as a terrorist with a machine gun, a picture of Osama Bin Laden on the wall, and the U.S. flag burning in the fire place. Normally I love cartoons and see them for what they are: cartoons. But the U.S. is a most uptight country with regards to elections, the U.S. doesn't necessarily elect the candidate who has the most skills and is best suited for the job, but rather the candidate who appears the best in other ways, such as how Christian they are and how unblemished their past is and how few rumors there are about them. This cartoon can easily convince many Americans that Barack Obama is ill-suited for president. So I can laugh about this cartoon, but at the same time I see that this cartoon can change the U.S. elections in November.

Howard Milano

Gay marriage

2008-07-15T19:48:00.000-07:00

Massachusetts is trying to make it easier for out-of-state gay couples to marry there, by repealing a 1913 law that originally blocked out-of-state inter-racial couples from marrying. In 2004, then-Gov. Mitt Romney used that 1913 law to block out-of-state gay couples from marrying in Massachusetts. The current governor Deval Patrick supports the repeal, perhaps because his daughter is a lesbian? I think this is all good. My philosophy is: if it doesn't hurt anybody, people can go right ahead. Most hetero people who condemn gay marriages base it on the 2000 year old Bible, as if the Bible has any relation to current society. We don't enforce laws passed 2000 years ago, why would we enforce morals that were acceptable 2000 years ago. The Bible is fine for religious study. It's a poor manual to learn to live in modern society.

Howard Milano

Inflation Zimbabwe style

2008-07-14T20:27:00.000-07:00

In case you're upset about $4 gas prices, read this article about the Zimbabwe runaway inflation or try this Google search. One of the biggest threats to Zimbabwe is not the inflation, but the repeated printing of new bank notes! Germany is withholding paper and also parts for printing machines in retaliation for the recent shady elections, and there is a good chance that Zimbabwe will not be able to print bank notes anymore in the near future. The only bright spot is that many Zimbabweans are now multi-billionaires.

Howard Milano

Rangel's rent-stabilized apartments

2008-07-11T19:39:00.001-07:00

Ah, it's always good to belong to the "have's". U.S. Rep. Charles Rangel owns four rent-stabilized apartments in Harlem, and thinks there is nothing wrong with that. This in a place where landlords love to kick out long term renters of rent-stabilized apartments so the rent can be adjusted or the apartment can be changed into a market-rate apartment. This is in a place where many people would love to live in a rent-stabilized apartment to get some relief from ever increasing rents. Landlords regularly kick out renters who rent more than one rent-stabilized apartment, and rightfully so, but Rangel is apparently thick with his landlord and is in no danger of losing any of his four apartments. Like I said, make sure you belong to the "have's", it's a lot more comfortable.

Howard Milano

Super bishops in Church of England

2008-07-10T22:47:00.000-07:00

The Church of England keeps busy with infighting about women bishops and gay priests. The latest idea of uptight male members of the Church is "Super Bishops". Yep, the brilliant plan is to allow women to become bishop, but elevate male bishops to "Super Bishops" to make sure men keep the ultimate power positions. The excuse is that Jesus was a man, had only male disciples, and wanted only men to be in power positions. At least the Church of England is doing slightly better than the Catholic Church, who released a communication that they were disappointed. That figures since the Catholic Church doesn't even allow women to be priests. I just can't understand that religions put such severe restrictions on their believers. As a Catholic you pretty much can't do anything (no sex outside of marriage, no condoms, no drugs, etc. etc.). When I heard that Bahá'í Faith followers are not allowed to drink alcohol I immediately knew I would never join that religion! I guess a lot of people believe that a religion without restrictions is not a religion worth following. You have to suffer to reach heaven. Well, my religion is really simple. Be nice to the people around you and treat them as you would want others to treat you.

Howard Milano

2007-10-18T19:58:00.000-07:00

Sometimes you just have to admire the ingenuity of a criminal, in this case a man who would steal gasoline from gas stations by parking his trailer over the access hatch of the underground gas tanks, open a trap door in his trailer, and pump gas from the underground tanks into a tank in his trailer. Then he would transfer it to bigger tanks at his business and resell it! He probably got caught by becoming too greedy. But still, my hat off to this man for coming up with such an excellent plan.

Howard Milano

2007-10-06T09:51:00.000-07:00

The RIAA won their first juried trial against a file-sharing person, and the jury ordered the woman to pay $220,000 to the RIAA. I wonder if the RIAA is celebrating now, because if I were them I wouldn't. This is not exactly going to make the RIAA more popular. Even if many people think the file-sharing woman was indeed guilty, there is hardly anybody who thinks the punishment is fair. An outcome like this makes people lose faith in the justice system, and by sheer association, the RIAA will become even more the outright bully they already are. It will be interesting to see if there will be more lawsuits. The RIAA has a weaker case against some other people who are seeking a trial, and if the RIAA loses a trial, we will see a lot more excitement! In any case, file-sharing is not going to stop because of this, and in the long run the RIAA will have to stop pestering people. RIAA, a smart person seeks peace, not war.

Howard Milano

2007-09-16T09:46:00.000-07:00

Some of the big banks raised their ATM fees to $3. Bank of America, naturally, is spearheading this effort. I call them a bunch of crooks. It actually saves the banks money when people use the ATM to get cash, instead of going in the bank and taking valuable time away from teller people. These ATM fees really are extortion, and with all extortion, it's tempting to charge more. They're designed to get easy money from the unlucky, in the wrong place, not well connected, underfunded person. Sure, banks are supposed to waive the fee if you're a customer, or your bank is a member of a recognized surcharge free network, or you have plenty of money, but there are still people to which this doesn't apply. Plus the burden is on the customer, I've been charged fees on machines that were part of my bank's surcharge free network, and it's up to me to spend hours trying to show I should get my fee back.

Howard Milano

2007-09-07T18:06:00.000-07:00

Here's another man proclaiming that abortion is not a human right, this time it's the Catholic Pope who's saying it. People often get criticized when they give opinions about things they don't know anything about, but that's not true if anybody gives opinions about abortions. Here is a man who apparently never had sex, and he freely gives his opinion about abortion, and we're supposed to accept his words? He has two strikes against him, a man and no sex! Opinions about abortion should come from women, and preferably women who had abortions.

Howard Milano

2007-08-29T07:41:00.000-07:00

Yet another Republican scandal, Senator Larry E. Craig of Idaho arrested in the men's bathroom in an airport after making sexual advances to a police officer under cover. Apparently he made a confession during or after his arrest. Now the Senator claims he was confused and made false statements because of the stressful situation, and he says he's not gay! What's disturbing about this is not that the Senator is gay or not, he can be as gay as he likes to be, but how little control the Senator has over his actions, decisions, and life in general. He even admits that he "overreacted and made a poor decision" while being arrested and he didn't consult attorneys, family or anybody. He now blames everybody and everything except himself. And this man is a Senator leading our country, he sounds and acts more like a ten year old. As they like to say here in the U.S.: God help us all!

Howard Milano

2007-08-09T09:29:00.001-07:00

Johnson & Johnson, supposedly a "family" company is suing the charitable Red Cross organization for using a red cross on commercial products benefiting the Red Cross. Yes, I know all about defending your trademarks and such, but please, isn't this going a bit too far? The Red Cross organization was even started, using a Red Cross their symbol I'm sure, before Johnson & Johnson began to use the Red Cross as a trademark, making the case of Johnson & Johnson not very convincing. I would say that there can only be negative publicity coming out of this for Johnson & Johnson. The Red Cross organization probably has 95% or more positive name recognition in the world, and I can't see too many people taking the side of Johnson & Johnson in this case, except the lawyers of course. Johnson & Johnson, if you want to be smart in this case, you should manufacture and market the merchandise for the Red Cross, combining the use of your trade marks.

Howard Milano

2007-08-06T09:12:00.000-07:00

Almost 200,000 weapons are missing in Iraq, weapons supposedly given to the Iraqi forces, but more likely by now used to fight American soldiers. One surprising bit of news is that the U.S. doesn't keep track of the serial numbers of the weapons given out, it only registered the numbers of 3% of the weapons. It's hard to believe that anybody still thinks the Bush administration and the U.S. Army are doing a great job in Iraq after such news. One cause of this mess is the fact that the U.S. Army disbanded the Iraqi Army soon after Iraq was occupied. They had plenty of soldiers willing to be part of a new Iraq Army, but the U.S. wanted to start fresh, hand picking the new soldiers, and the new Iraq Army has had troubles restarting. But rule #1 should be registering serial numbers of weapons handed out, to the U.S. troops, and to anybody else. Otherwise you don't know who is going to shoot at you next.

Howard Milano

2007-08-01T21:39:00.000-07:00

John C. Dvorak's recent article "Bubble 2.0 coming soon" is filled with unhappiness. The point he is trying to get across is that the world will soon experience the end of yet another Internet Bubble, Bubble 2.0 (Web 2.0), child of the previous Internet Bubble, the 1999 - 2000 Dot.Com Bubble. The end of Bubble 2.0 will be more severe than the Dot.Com Bubble, and all we have to look forward to is an endless progression of new Internet Bubbles, each collapsing more violently than the ones before. Dvorak paints a bleak picture. However, I wonder if he's been looking around lately. If there are any current Bubbles, it's the collapsed Housing Bubble, which caused the currently collapsing Mortgage Bubble, and is threatening a more globally collapsing Finance Company Bubble. Who, except apparently Dvorak, thinks Web 2.0 is in any trouble right now? Internet companies are doing fine, P/E's are not at crazy heights, online ads are supplying tons of money, social interactions are thriving online, T.V. is merging with online video offerings. Web 2.0 seems a lot more healthy to me than the Dot.Com craze.

Howard Milano

2007-07-23T07:53:00.000-07:00

I have been wondering why Google bought YouTube, and articles about YouTube participating in the Presidential Debates are making me realize that Google wants to use YouTube as some sort of T.V. station. Not a real T.V. station that broadcasts on the regular T.V., but a T.V. station broadcasting on personal computers. Finally it makes sense why Google bought YouTube. Sure there are news stations that publish on-line, and have printed stories in addition to video stories, but YouTube is more powerful, it's all video. It's simple to add more categories to YouTube, and make some of the categories more "serious", such as news categories, commentary categories, etc. Google is positioning YouTube to be the next T.V., or at least the next T.V. broadcasting on personal computers.

Howard Milano

2007-07-18T09:27:00.000-07:00

The Iraq war has been a hot topic lately. An Intelligence report claims Iraq based Al-Qaeda is most likely to attach Americans on U.S. soil. The next day Iraq based Al-Qaeda is shown to be not as strong as suspected, and mostly run by foreigners. The Democrats hold an all night debate to try to gather votes to pass a law for early withdrawal of U.S. troops out of Iraq. Even Discover Magazine, not known for war or politics stories, published an article about the medical care breaking down in Iraq, many doctors fleeing if they don't want to be killed, lots of civilians dying and suffering. And Republican politicians are distancing themselves from the way Bush is handling the Iraq war, in fear of losing elections. Meanwhile Bush, of course, is doing his normal routine, everything is fine in Iraq, we're making progress, the recent troop surge is having the desired effects, etc. It's a nasty, dirty war, with no end in sight (yet), and anybody claiming the U.S. did the right thing invading Iraq might take a closer look at the current situation.

Howard Milano

2007-06-20T08:02:00.001-07:00

Some nice examples of Wall Street seedy stock price manipulation activity: both Home Depot (HD) and Expedia (EXPE) announced huge share buy back programs, which sent their share prices soaring. The companies pledged to buy back "up to" a certain number of their own shares. A quick look at their financials (use the "Key Statistics link on the financial Yahoo pages) shows that if either company bought back all the shares they pledged to buy back, they would be hugely in the red, and Home Depot is already in the red, even after they go through with their planned sale of the contractor's division. The key words are "up to". They will buy back 10 or 20% of those shares pledged, if at all, and at a steep price, and then life goes on with a higher share price. A smart, decent company would buy back the shares quietly, at a cheap price, and announce the buy back later. Invest at your own risk!

Howard Milano

2007-06-20T07:19:00.000-07:00

Salman Rushdie recently got knighted. I was a bit surprised that Salman wanted that much publicity, I thought he was enjoying a quiet life now that every Muslim was not out to kill him. Remember he published "The Satanic Verses", and a Fatwa was issued to kill him because the book insulted Islam? That Fatwa was later retracted, although some Muslims believe a Fatwa is issued for life. Now every Muslim is upset again, claiming this is a new insult, and I'm not surprised, if you can get upset about a book, a Knighthood that says the writer is the most excellent guy will most likely upset you again, and even more. Curiously neither the writers organization lobbying for that Knighthood, nor the committee that recommended the Knighthood, nor the Senate that approved that Knighthood thought this was a bad idea! This shows me that you can put a bunch of intelligent people together and they can still easily come up with a catastrophic idea. Seems any common sense was completely lacking here.

Howard Milano

2007-06-10T19:28:00.000-07:00

Just great, Senator Joseph Lieberman said recently that "the United States should consider a military strike against Iran because of Tehran's involvement in Iraq." And that from somebody who is running for President of the U.S. in 2008. Is this a statement that is supposed to make us all feel warm and cozy and protected and make us vote for Lieberman? As I have said before, war is one of the most primitive ways of solving conflicts, and a first strike war has no place in this world anymore if we want to call ourselves civilized in any way. Lieberman also shows he completely misunderstands how badly overstretched the military, and the tax payers, already are with 2 U.S. supported conflicts raging in Iraq and Afghanistan. Yeah, I want to vote for somebody who will spend even more on war efforts and drive us all into military ruled poverty. Let's hope a more peaceful person will become the next U.S. President, the U.S. really needs that.

Howard Milano

2007-06-10T17:17:00.000-07:00

Here is a link to a recent PBS story about credit card companies. It's the usual story about big banks robbing little people while maintaining they're doing nothing wrong. Think your credit card rate is fixed for a certain time? Banks can change their rates for any reason with 15 days notice. Think a high credit score insures a low rate? People with high credit scores who pay off their cards religiously likely have the highest rates (I am one such example). Many people have high credit card balances while they have money in the bank to pay off those balances (their excuse is they need to maintain a nest egg for emergencies), which indicates those people have troubles understanding interest rates and especially compounding interest rates. Meanwhile there's hardly anybody who reads and actually understands credit card agreements, violating a basic notion that contracts should be understandable by both parties involved. A good story to watch.

Howard Milano

2007-05-24T20:45:00.000-07:00

Al Gore is busy, but he's not busy at running for U.S. President. Gore won the popular vote in 2000, but lost the election to lame duck President Bush the Younger, called Shrub by some, and Gore has gained in popularity since then. Many people believe that Gore could win the 2008 Presidential Election with no problem. There are oodles of Republican and Democrat candidates who have been campaigning it seems forever already, and it's still a long, long time till the election. The bitter infighting and name calling has already started, and it usually gets much worse when we get closer to the election. There is the usual positioning on issues such as abortion, gays, sex before marriage, divorce, etc., all issues that have zilch to do with being a good President. The digging up of scandals to disqualify contenders is a nation-wide pastime. No wonder Gore is relaxing, not ruling out running for President, and not announcing he is running. He has already been grilled, vetted, and approved several times in the past, he has nothing left to prove. I expect him to join the race at the last moment, spend the least time necessary campaigning, and become the next U.S. President.

Howard Milano

2007-05-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

The Anglican Church keeps stirring up the gay/lesbian debate, and gays and lesbians are not welcome at the Lambeth conference, despite the fact that the conference is "an occasion to rediscover the reality of the Church itself as a worldwide community united by the call and grace of Christ". Notice "community united", as in united as long as you're not gay or lesbian. This is the main reason I'm not religious, the insistence of every religion to condemn certain people or certain behavior, where those people and behaviors are perfectly fine and accepted by the majority of society. It's funny how your work will allow any religion or sexual preferences, but your religion will discriminate on sexual preference. Jesus Christ is about accepting, and treating others the way you want to be treated. I see little of that in any of the major Christian religions.

Howard Milano

2007-05-22T19:41:00.000-07:00

Interesting articles about the U.S. Muslim survey by the Pew Research Center. What's encouraging is that there is much assimilation of Muslims in the U.S. However, the articles do mention that 13% of Muslims, and up to 25% of younger Muslims, support suicide attacks, at least in some cases, and that's in the U.S. In some other Western countries, that ratio is 25 - 33%, while in Muslim countries it's up to 50%. Now, suicide attacks are about the most selfish, the most coward, and the most evil forms of killing: you don't give the people who get killed a warning or chance to fight, you kill women, children, and men with no regard for anything, you make a giant mess, you spread fear, you proclaim you're justified in doing this by your religion, even though your religion explicitly forbids killing, and on top of all that you kill yourself before anybody has a chance to bring you before a court of law so you can explain your act of extreme violence. I can only hope suicide bombers go straight to hell.

Howard Milano

2007-05-14T16:54:00.000-07:00

Lots of news articles about Microsoft threatening Linux, saying that Linux violates hundreds of patents Microsoft owns. I can't wait for Microsoft to actually sue Linux, and all the Linux users who right now mostly have free operating systems that don't nag you, that don't phone home constantly to see if your legally bought operating system is really, really legal, that let you freely re-install the operating system as many times as you want without freezing up and forcing you to call big Daddy Microsoft to prove, again, you have a legal copy of Microsoft Windows. For Microsoft, which has the luxury of 90+ percent of the desktops running a copy of Windows, it must be a colossal irritant to see those 10% of the other desktops have such a free flowing life. I actually like the Microsoft operating systems, and I run a (legal) copy of XP, but I detest Microsoft the company, the arrogant big bully, the monopoly that can't get enough. Go ahead Microsoft, sue Linux, I want to see the fireworks!

Howard Milano

2007-04-26T08:05:00.000-07:00

One of the reasons I dislike Catholicism, besides that they don't allow abortion, birth control, female priests and gays, is that they have the concept of "Limbo", or rather they had it. Limbo is the place where newly born babies go if they die unbaptized, they can't go to heaven since they carry "original sin" (what???). This bizarre and stupid religious law has been in place for more than 800 years. It looks like it was put in place by religious leaders to scare people into baptizing their babies ASAP, but apparently it was created based on rigid religious interpretations of life. After three years of study, a commission decided that this Limbo place doesn't “reflect Christ’s special love for the little ones.” So it took the Catholic church 803 years to realize something everybody else instinctively knows: little babies are about as pure and innocent as you can get, and if there is a heaven, and if anybody goes to it, little babies do. So it is one down, many more discriminations to go for the Catholic Church.

Howard Milano

2007-04-15T00:04:00.000-07:00

The Abstinence Until Marriage Program the Bush administration had dreamed up to limit teenager sex has been shown to be a failure. I can only be glad that a proper scientific study has shown that the religious and moral rules and regulations the Bush administration is trying to force down the U.S. population's throat are not effective in tempering teenage hormones. I mean, what an idiotic thought that teaching about abstinence would convince hormone driven teenagers to abstain from Sex. Teenagers abstain from Sex for various reasons, but once hormones are taking over, no abstinence education is going to stop anybody (teenagers or adults). What really ticks me off is the Marriage clause. Marriage has not been a success lately in the U.S. with many marriages ending in divorce. This way, Bush is pushing teenagers into hastily arranged marriages just to be able to have Sex.

Howard Milano

2007-04-10T23:11:00.000-07:00

Recent polls show that more than 90% of people (polled) believed that neither race nor gender, which presumably are mentioned in relation to Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, play any role in their decision about who will be the next U.S. President. Yeah, right! I find that just a little hard to believe. The news regularly features stories about racism and misogyny, and especially stories about how people often think they're not a racist or misogynist, but they would never make friends with anybody who is of a different color, and they believe that women belong in the kitchen. When these 90% of the people (polled) are standing alone inside the anonymous voting booth, their true beliefs will take over (who wants to admit being a racist in a poll), and that white man will look awfully good as the next U.S. President.

Howard Milano

2007-03-14T22:44:00.000-07:00

It's appalling how uptight and stupid the U.S. government is with respect to enforcing marijuana laws, and particularly medical marijuana laws. The latest story of the courts rejecting a dying woman's wish to continue using marijuana to relieve her pains and increase her appetite shows a cry of help shrugged off by the stone hearted upholders of a ridiculous law. This is a country where you're free to get as drunk as you want on heavily taxed liquor, but you're not free to smoke an easily grown herb, even if doctors and research agree that it's medically beneficial. The U.S. government should finally wake up from their booze stupor and realize that making marijuana a taxable and tradeable commodity is a win-win decision for everybody. Imagine taxes coming in, jails emptied of convicted marijuana smokers, medical patients relieved from pain and anxiety, and happy citizens who can decide between booze and marijuana for their nightly relaxing.

Howard Milano

2007-03-14T07:43:00.000-07:00

It is well known that the people in the U.S. are sue-happy, and that a large portion of the redistribution of wealth is brought about by suing other people. Now the survivors of 17 sailors who died on the USS Cole that was attacked by terrorists in Sudan in 2000 are suing Sudan, claiming that the attack could not have happened without the help of Sudan. Wow, people are really trying to broaden the scope of suing. Not happy anymore about suing neighbors, businesses, conglomerates, or even the government, people are now suing other countries. In addition, serving in the military, with its clear risks such as getting wounded or dying in the line of duty, is now treated as just another job where you can sue if something goes wrong. It is as if these people think they know better and want to be treated as equals by countries involved in warfare. Looks like it is going to be pretty crowded in U.S. court rooms in the future.

Howard Milano

2007-02-25T18:14:00.000-08:00

If you had to bury a coin in a well known place and let people hunt for it, where would you bury it? I wonder how many people would come up with a similar place as the one British Cadbury Schweppes came up with? They decided the best place was a 347 year old cemetery, and conveniently enough, a cemetery in another country! Are the people in charge of ideas at Cadbury Schweppes total idiots? A cemetery is for burying dead people, and digging in cemeteries is reserved for B-movies, or official police inquiries. Perhaps the Cadbury people thought the 'bury' part of their name entitled them to cemetery treasure hunts? Of course plenty of people registered for the treasure hunt, and actually showed up at the cemetery, shovels in hand, ready to dig some holes and search for the treasure. I'm glad the cemetery was coincidentally closed when the treasure hunters showed up. Please, let the dead rest.

Howard Milano

2007-01-30T20:54:00.000-08:00

"Bush accused of distorting evidence on climate change" reads a recent headline in the Independent. I just had to laugh really loud when I read that. Bush's approval ratings are already lower than almost any other President ever, and now people are gladly stepping up to discredit him even more. I guess this all refers to the times when Bush insisted there was no global warming, while almost every scientist in the world was becoming convinced of the threat of global warming. There are still people who think Bush is a genius President, I met one just a couple of weeks ago, so not all is lost for Bush. I read a cute comic recently where Bush asked his speech writer to come up with something that would please everybody in both political parties, and the punch line was: "I resign!".

Howard Milano

2007-01-27T15:38:00.000-08:00

Yet another example of prude justice going awry. Julie Amero, a substitute 7-th grade school teacher, was convicted by a jury of 4 felonies of "risk of injury to a minor, or impairing the morals of a child" with a recommended sentence of 40 years in prison, because the computer at her work kept showing pornographic images despite her efforts to stop that flow of images. Experts confirmed this was caused by malicious spyware, but some experts also determined the spyware must have been installed after the user, supposedly Julie Amero, visited some 'bad' web sites. Now let's step back. What!!!!!!! 40 Years in prison for visiting a site that installs porn spewing spyware on your computer! Sure, put her away for a year or so if they can prove she surfed porn sites on the school's computer (there are children around after all), but 40 years on skimpy evidence? Interestingly, a later editorial provides more details, the teacher might not even have surfed the web at all, and anybody else, including the children, might have surfed to some site and triggered installation of the spyware.

Howard Milano

2007-01-24T08:07:00.000-08:00

The new Libby trial is a giant waste of tax payer's time and money, and it nicely typifies the Bush administration, which always has been secretive with an attitude of we can do whatever we want to do. Apparently Libby was supposed to go down quietly and take all the blame in order to protect Rove. Libby is accused of lying and such, but by now, everybody including president Bush has been lying and lying. If you haven't studied this issue intensively, you are probably greatly confused by now. The people who actually leaked the details about Valerie Plame's CIA job, and lied about leaking it, are going free, while the people who lied about knowing about Valerie's CIA job are being accused? Or something stupid like that. And it's all Save Rove because he is the most important person in the Bush administration. Hmmm, I remember Rove being awfully wrong about the Iraq war, despite his reputed stellar intelligence, and not able to listen to what other people say.

Howard Milano

2007-01-10T19:49:00.000-08:00

Time Warner is trying to end the HD wars between HD DVD and Blu-ray by combining the two formats into one "Total HD" format. Although I can't deny this is a clever marketing move, I really hope the world outside of Time Warner will not totally lose their common sense, and see what's really going on: 2 + 1 does not make 1, it makes 3. So now we have 3 formats! Apparently the new Total HD format combines the two other formats on one disk, one on each side. Net result is that we're still stuck with different formats, which causes consumer confusion, and forces manufacturers to make too many models, and forces stores to stock endless variations of the same merchandise. I have to say I'm enjoying this.

Howard Milano

2006-12-22T13:33:00.000-08:00

Researchers in Japan have "captured" a giant squid. Giant squids have mostly evaded researchers because the squids tend to live very deep down in the ocean. This article starts out all interesting and exciting, but becomes more of a horror story at the end. The giant squid was not really captured, instead it was killed trying to haul it aboard for the "study". And what is even more appalling, the researchers say that they now know better how to "capture" giant squids, which "could help open up more fruitful research into the poorly understood animal" and make the researchers "more successful at studying them in the future". Great, scientists killing elusive animals to understand them better. For all we know, these scientists just killed the last giant squid in existence.

Howard Milano

2006-11-15T07:00:00.000-08:00

Didn't we all forget about O.J. Simpson, except perhaps when we make some lame jokes when we see a lone glove found somewhere? Well, he's back, and at the tune of at least 3.5 million dollars. He's selling his "How I did it if I would have done it" book and T.V. interview for enough money to last his life. Of course we will never know for sure he committed murder or not, he was acquitted in his murder trial, and later found liable in a wrongful death suit, but do we need to have our noses rubbed into this mess? Fox is predicting record numbers of viewers and eager advertisers paying for commercials. I find it the pinnacle of sleaziness, and yes, what else could I expect from Fox and O.J. Simpson? Hopefully people will have enough decency and sense to avoid the book and the T.V. interview, do we really want to learn how we can kill, lie about it, and profit from it?

Howard Milano

2006-11-06T06:57:00.000-08:00

International air travel will soon be more restricted. This is from the new rules proposed by the Custom and Border Protection Agency of Home Land Security: "Accordingly, with this proposed rule, CBP is proposing two transmission options for air carriers to select from at their discretion: (i) the submission of complete manifests no later than 60 minutes prior to departure or (ii) transmitting passenger data as individual, real-time transactions, i.e., as each passenger checks in, up to but no later than 15 minutes prior to departure. Under both options, the carrier will not permit the boarding of a passenger unless the passenger has been cleared by CBP." Right now the rule is to transmit these data 15 minutes after take-off. Slowly but surely the freedom of citizens is taken away, pretty sure we'll have to obtain clearance before we buy international airfare.

Howard Milano

2006-11-03T17:53:00.000-08:00

Yet another hypocrite exposed. Popular evangelist Ted Haggard, president of the National Association of Evangelicals, happily married, five kids, anti-gay, anti-gay-marriage, pro-family, got accused of having sex with a gay male prostitute while snorting methamphetamine. It was funny to see how quickly he changed his story. First: I'm totally faithful, never had sex with anybody except my wife, never used drugs, will not resign. Next: Will resign, and part of the allegations are true. Next: Okay, so I bought the drugs, but I never used them (he threw them away!), and I approached the man for a "massage", I never had sex with him. All this from a man who preached that gay marriage is wrong, drugs are bad, straight family life is where it's at. I don't care if you have gay sex and lie about it, I don't care if you do drugs and lie about it. But please don't be a hypocrite and convince the world that gay sex and drugs are bad while doing it yourself.

Howard Milano

2006-10-31T18:38:00.000-08:00

Elephants have joined the elite self-awareness club. I think they should have joined a long time ago, but you know how science sometimes makes mistakes, and in this case a huge mistake. Elephants were given self-awareness tests before, but the scientists used small mirrors out of reach of the elephants. I can vividly see the testing: (scientists) well, let's see, we need a mirror, have to be careful, those mirrors break easily especially around such a HUGE animal, let's be smart and make the mirror not too big and let's make sure the elephants can't touch it because they would break it right away, ... let's see, yep, no self-awareness, they don't pay any attention to the mirror. That's two mistakes, a huge animal needs a huge mirror, and elephants are extremely tactile, they have to be able to touch. Anyway, I'm glad it all worked out and I welcome those smart elephants to self-awareness.

Howard Milano

2006-10-18T08:28:00.000-07:00

For a good laugh, read this article which talks about an optical disc which can play in any CD/DVD drive, but can also be plugged into a USB port. Yes, you read it right, a round disc that is also a USB plug. See the article, or the patent application, to enjoy the picture of this monster brought to life by the obviously twisted mind of some computer engineer geek. I do enjoy brilliant ideas for simple devices, but somehow this doesn't fit. It's obvious that this gadget is not for the customer's enjoyment, because otherwise it would be a USB device or a disc. No, instead it's all about making sure the content of the disc are acquired legally by forcing the customer into a dance of plugging the disc into the USB port, and then quickly playing it, or perhaps the other way around. Needless to say, there is now more to break and go wrong. And I'm still searching for the USB port on my CD player.

Howard Milano

2006-10-13T00:39:00.000-07:00

I kind of like the way the Amish handle calamities, especially the aftermath. They reached out compassionately to the family of the shooter who recently killed several young children. They razed the school building where the shootings took place and plan to keep the site as an open pasture. There are no plans to turn the site into a memorial. Known for their dislike of modern technology, the Amish usually construct their buildings by hand, but they preferred a hands off approach tearing down the school building, letting impersonal machines do the work in the dark as quickly as possible. May the children who lost their lives rest in peace.

Howard Milano

2006-10-05T15:41:00.000-07:00

Some companies have too much expensive lawyer time on their hands. Hormel Foods, which owns the trademark 'Spam', as in spicy ham food product, in the food services domain, also tried to register 'Spam', as in spam email, in several computer services domains. You might think, so what, but if Hormel had succeeded, they could sue people for using 'Spam' to designate any kind of unwanted email and those same people would have to start searching for a new term for 'spam email'. In other words, Hormel tried to take 'Spam', as in email, out of the public domain to protect their 'Spam', as in spicy food, trademark. Hormel instead should bless their lucky souls that 'Spam' is such a universally recognized name and capitalize on it, instead of paying high fees to lawyers. Slogans such as: "the Spam you like, not the other Spam you hate" come to mind. Fighting established generic use of a trademark is just like spitting into the wind.

Howard Milano

2006-10-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

It's the prohibition days all over again. The U.S. Senate passed a bill that "prohibits U.S. financial institutions from processing transactions involving on-line betting, effectively blocking U.S. customers from gambling on foreign-based websites". In their unlimited wisdom, the Senate has deemed gambling illegal, or rather, it has deemed some gambling illegal. Of course, you can gamble your heart out in any of the many casinos in the U.S., but gambling in your own house, oh no, that should be outlawed. In good old U.S. fashion, the Senate did not try to legalize and tax on-line gambling in order to regulate it and make money from it, no, instead the Senate choose the war path, make on-line gambling illegal, declare war on on-line gambling, and spend a lot of money trying to contain it. We all know that on-line gambling will be legal sometime in the future, there are just too many gamblers in the U.S. with lots of money. The Senate should be wise, legalize it right away, and make a lot of money from it.

Howard Milano

2006-09-30T17:07:00.000-07:00

What a waste of money. The U.S. Senate has approved the building of 700 more miles of fencing between the U.S. and Mexico. Yeah, right, as if that is going to help with stopping people from crossing the border illegally. Sure, it's going to make it a little harder to cross the border, but it'll still be possible. First, the fence is not going to stretch along the whole border, plenty of unfenced places left, and second, some of these many hundreds of miles of fencing are in lonely places where it shouldn't be too hard to cut through the fence. What is worrisome is that the Senate reached such an unimaginative solution to this problem. Talking about hitting the problem with a huge hammer. Alternative solutions such as guest worker programs were hardly considered. On top of all this, they're going to build new detention facilities to hold ever increasing numbers of border crossers. Fence, check, prisons, check, bullying attitude to keep people out, check, net result, plenty of illegal aliens to do all the work Americans don't want to do.

Howard Milano

2006-09-27T01:32:00.000-07:00

High alert! It appears that Microsoft has become the favorite child of the U.S. A ZDNet.UK article reports that "European Commissioner Neelie Kroes said the US embassy in Brussels had asked her to be "nicer" to Microsoft ahead of her decision to fine the software giant €280m in July." Amazing, I don't know what bone-headed politicians, or for that matter Microsoft executives, were involved in dreaming up this effort, but a child can see that any European Commissioner, especially if she is Dutch, is going to balk at changing the ruling of an anti-trust case after a long and thorough investigation, just because one has to be "nice" to the defendant. I especially like Neelie's remark: "In my work, I cannot have a preference. I have, however, a personal opinion, but that is for Saturday night." Of course, typically, Microsoft denied any involvement, and the US Embassy had no comment.

Howard Milano

2006-09-27T01:10:00.000-07:00

Wished I had thought of this first: VaporStream allows users to send email, and once the email is read, all traces of it are destroyed. The company also claims that the header and body of the emails are never stored together, thus making it kind of difficult to trace a message to its sender and receiver. I like it! One reason I like it is that my emails are just piling up all over the place. Any self respecting person nowadays has at least 3 or 4 email addresses, most with virtually unlimited storage, and the normal way of handling an email after reading it is just to leave it around, either in the inbox or in some folder. With these new self destructing emails, receiving emails just got a little more exciting, you actually have to think and actively decide if you want to save an email by copying it or let it go to dust. The other reason I like it is that this will upset lots of people, such as NSA, CIA, FBI kind of types. Way to go, VaporStream!

Howard Milano

2006-09-12T19:11:00.000-07:00

The latest from the front of "you're guilty till proven innocent" comes from the unfriendly folks at the Embroidery Software Protection Coalition. Their mission in life is to find and prosecute people who steal embroidery patterns. Think RIAA except instead of music downloads here there are embroidery pattern downloads. Now I can understand these people want to protect their products, but please, don't be so unfriendly about it. Basically their arguments are if you buy counterfeit designs, you're guilty, don't know the designs are counterfeit, you're still guilty, don't know how to determine the designs are counterfeit, well ask the seller (yeah that is really good advice, thanks!). I especially like this quote: "If a brain surgeon opens your cranium and takes a peek inside your brain, does he see ideas and intelligence? Just because he only sees a brain, can he determine the content? And if he cannot measure any content, does that mean you are mindless? No." The FAQ site then rambles on about how most everything dealing with copyright is illegal. A fine FAQ site, and good luck prosecuting those embroidery people who mostly fall in the 65+ age group.

Howard Milano

2006-08-31T21:57:00.000-07:00

I can finally relax now. The missing Edvard Munch's painting 'The Scream' has finally been recovered, after it was stolen about 2 years ago. I sort of like that painting, and so do, apparently, a lot of other people. That painting is one of the world's most recognisable paintings. I was absolutely convinced the painting had disappeared forever, hanging in some rich person's secret Art vault, only to be admired by the few lucky guests who would keep their mouth shut. Art such as this should be shared. I think many people like this painting because it's so easy to relate to it, we can all remember how we held our head screaming with maddening frustration. It's Art for the masses, but at the same time it's so well done that it's also Art for eternity.

Howard Milano

2006-08-30T08:50:00.000-07:00

Grab your chance now! You will be able to legally download music for free! The music downloads will be supported by ad revenues. Users will be forced to watch commercials for 90 seconds before they can download their tune. The 90 second window is plenty of time for a bathroom break, a drink break, a sandwich break, any kind of break. If you spread your downloads over time, you can easily multitask, "watch" your commercials in one window, while emailing, cruising the Web, organizing your photos, even playing the tunes you just downloaded. I predict no shortage of happy, productive downloaders. It's great to see music downloads make this big circle from the Napster time of free downloads to prosecution of free downloaders to the SpiralFrog time of free downloads. Goodbye RIAA lawsuits, goodbye expensive iTunes and MSN music downloads.

Howard Milano

2006-08-29T08:41:00.000-07:00

The NY Times now serves up the news to you only if you deserve it. Some studly computer programming can sniff out the IP, and country of origin, of the reader and let in only the news they're "allowed" to see. One of the justifications for the censoring was this quote from George Freeman, vice president and assistant general counsel of The New York Times Co: "But we're dealing with a country that, while it doesn't have a First Amendment, it does have a free press, and it's our position it that we ought to respect that country's laws." He was talking about Great Britain. Now, let me get this straight, they have a free press so we should respect that and censor this (press) article. I guess the next step is to rewrite articles on the fly targeting the current reader. Of course in the near future we will all have a unique IP assigned to us and censoring anything, including the news, will routinely be done on the personal level. The Personal Filtered Web, not the World Wide Web.

Howard Milano

2006-08-29T08:00:00.000-07:00

HP has added a nifty option to their cameras, a way to make people look thinner in photographs. Like all good ideas, it's extremely simple, you horizontally squeeze together the center of the picture, where the willing victim supposedly stands, and you horizontally stretch the left and right side. Presto, the person in the middle will look thinner and of course more attractive. The perfect tool now that every day I read Google News I see articles about more and more people being obese. The article also mentions that Photoshop is becoming a commodity among more sophisticated digital camera users. Makes sense, doesn't it, there is nothing more luring than changing reality. Most digital photo alterations can still be detected forensically, but users can create "fake" realities, indistinguishable (with the naked eye) from "true" reality. Don't believe anything you see in print, including photographs!

Howard Milano

2006-08-23T19:34:00.000-07:00

Witch hunting is alive and well and is now being brought to Microsoft Messenger. To quote: "Users of Microsoft's Messenger email service will be able to report suspected sexual predators directly to the police at the click of a mouse." And: "Microsoft will add a 'report abuse' icon to Messenger that will link any users worried about their anonymous Internet buddies directly to online police services." Yeah! It appears the world simply doesn't learn from the past. I'm all for putting sexual predators in jail, preferably for life, but I also like 'innocent till proven guilty'. Microsoft is making it extremely easy for the general public, not known for its smarts, to assume 'guilty till proven innocent' and overwhelm the police with panicked reports. I wonder when this button will be removed again, witch hunting has proven to be fun as long as the hunter doesn't turn into the hunted.

Howard Milano

2006-08-23T19:11:00.000-07:00

Airlines will start allowing passengers to use their cell phones during flights. Polls have shown that a majority of people don't want to allow cell phones during flights, and the airlines themselves are divided about the subject. Michael O'Leary of Ryanair (RYA.I) has a refreshing opinion: "Why should I care <about the social cost of mid-air cell phones> if it is generating some money? Yeah, Michael, why should anybody care about flying Ryanair and giving you money? Other airlines are more public-oriented and wonder if it will annoy (too many) fliers. Personally I think it will be fun, people who fly are already edgy, and this will stir the pot even more. I fully expect planes to turn around because of on board fights about impolite cell phone usage. My biggest question is how people will be able to cell phone home when cell phones, and most other items, are now disallowed as carry-on luggage on many flights.

Howard Milano

2006-08-22T11:22:00.000-07:00

Turner broadcasting is sanitizing all their cartoons to cut out smoking cartoon figures, cartoons such as Tom and Jerry, The Flintstones and Scooby-Doo. The rational is that glamorizing smoking sets a bad example for kids, and the Turner people hasten to say that villains who smoke are not necessarily cut out, only heroes that smoke! All this was triggered by the complaint of ONE user who took offence to smoking in two Tom and Jerry cartoons. Sanitizing history has long been a favorite for humans. Book burning comes to mind. Censure has been liberally applied in the past. All this sanitizing is usually misdirected. It's fine for cartoons to show extreme violence, but lighting up a cigarette, oh no, that ruins kids. It's fine to have violent sports, like American football, but showing a naked breast during intermission, that's plain bad influence for everybody. It's impressive how history can be changed by complaining, not a complaint that the history is wrong, but that the history is not appropriate.

Howard Milano

2006-08-19T21:16:00.000-07:00

Wal-Mart got rid of its public relation officer, Andrew Young, who made disparaging remarks about "Jewish, Arab and Korean shop-owners “ripping off” urban communities". What is most beautiful about this are some of his statements : “It’s against everything I ever thought in my life. It never should have been said. I was speaking in the context of Atlanta, and that does not work in New York or Los Angeles.” This person was probably highly paid, contrary to the other Wal-Mart employees who work the stores, and he comes over as a person who dropped out of grade school to concentrate on independently refining his personal views of life. And he previously served as an UN Ambassador! Andrew Young's associate, John Hope Bryant, defended Andrew with this 'enlightening' statement: “Although he was not misquoted, Andrew Young tried to say in one sentence what would really have required a three-hour conversation and assumed that people would understand the point he was making.” At least the shopping public hardly cares, I drove by the local Wal-Mart today, and there wasn't a free parking place as far as I could see.

Howard Milano

2006-08-19T01:46:00.000-07:00

Google is offering free wifi in Mountain View, look at the map that shows the access points! I always liked downtown Mountain View, and now I like it even more. Really too bad I live 700+ miles away in beautiful Tucson, AZ. There is nothing better than being able to access the Internet on a whim anytime and anywhere the mood strikes, and I don't mean lurking outside apartment buildings or coffee shops, looking for open Internet connections called linksys. Talking about Google, I recently had lunch at Google HQ, and it's true, half of the lunch eaters were visitors, taking advantage of the free lunches served. I had no problems adding the sashimi salad and delicate chocolate treats to my tray, but otherwise it was hard to pick from half a dozen cuisines, each with many choices, and several salad bars, ready made food, juices, etc. And the people, it reminded me of an ant hill, lots of people everywhere. Fun place, I saw the offices, everybody has two 24" screens for their computer. If you know somebody who works at Google, make sure to pay that person a "work" visit.

Howard Milano

2006-08-10T12:35:00.000-07:00

Ahh, pretty soon we'll all be traveling naked on airplanes. Terrorists have now found ways to make liquid explosives, the logical next step is to weave explosives in clothing, and once we'll all travel naked, explosives will be surgically embedded in people.
Here is the current list of items ALLOWED as carry-on on planes:

Passengers may take through the airport security search point, in a single (ideally transparent) plastic carrier bag, only the following items. Nothing may be carried in pockets:

pocketsize wallets and pocket size purses plus contents (for example money, credit cards, identity cards etc. (not handbags));
travel documents essential for the journey (for example passports and travel tickets);
prescription medicines and medical items sufficient and essential for the flight (e.g. diabetic kit), except in liquid form unless verified as authentic.
spectacles and sunglasses, without cases.
contact lens holders, without bottles of solution.
for those traveling with an infant: baby food, milk (the contents of each bottle must be tasted by the accompanying passenger) and sanitary items sufficient and essential for the flight (diapers, wipes, creams and diaper disposal bags).
female sanitary items sufficient and essential for the flight, if unboxed (e.g. tampons, pads, towels and wipes).
tissues (unboxed) and/or handkerchiefs
keys (but no electrical key fobs)

Notice the lack of reading material (guess they figure most passengers are illiterate?). I love the specification of 'plastic (ideally transparent) bag'. Time to open a web store to sell fashionable plastic see-through bags!

On the serious side, terrorists are the lowest of lowest kind of basic humans. Killing of innocent people is simply not right, and the worst is that these terrorists claim their religion supports their actions.

Howard Milano

2006-06-27T18:40:00.000-07:00

The hard working politicians in Washington D.C. have found a new way to waste time. They're discussing changing the U.S. constitution to ban the burning of the American flag. Of course Bush is behind this, he wants to jack up his popularity by energizing conservatives with the carrot of the flag burning ban amendment. This is a classic case of "shouldn't you spend time and energy on solving real problems". There are no crowds of people endangering the world by burning flags. Most people will just throw their flags in the trash instead of burning them. Occasionally, a demonstrator will burn a flag, watched by millions of people on T.V. , and so what, it doesn't hurt people or animals and provides good entertainment. The political circus in Washington D.C goes on, wasting time and money on restricting harmless freedoms of the citizens.

Howard Milano

2006-06-26T18:31:00.000-07:00

Bush is mad that the media disclosed that the government sifts through banking transactions in search of terrorist activity. I think this is funny. Bush says it's classified, secret information that shouldn't be disclosed, and he finds it perfectly fine, and legal, to look at all banking transactions. Well, if it's really classified and secret, that information should have stayed classified and secret, meaning the newspapers would never have heard about it. But somebody talked too much and gave the secrets away. I think it's fair game, if somebody leaks information, it's the leaker that should be prosecuted, not the newspapers who have a right to tell the news as they hear it. Bush apparently believes the newspapers can only print what he tells them, not what they find out.

Howard Milano

2006-06-08T19:03:00.000-07:00

I'm getting pretty sick of all the idiotic, fanatical criticism of "The Da Vinci Code" book and movie. Now China is banning it, Christians are all upset, the Vatican advises its followers to boycott the book and movie, and everybody is coming up with these arguments of "The book says..., while we know for a fact that is untrue". I would like to say to all these upset people: Hello....., it's a novel, and a movie based on a novel. Ever understood what a novel is??? It's fiction, as in not true, as in made up. If you don't like what the book says, or you don't agree with it, don't read it, and don't see the movie. I find it hilarious that the Vatican condemns the book and movie, it shows a petty defensive attitude that makes me wonder how secure the Vatican is in their own Christian beliefs, and how much their condemnation is driven by fears of losing followers. If a religion can't survive criticism expressed in a novel (of all things), it's hard to get excited about the value of that religion.

Howard Milano

2006-06-04T13:08:00.000-07:00

The IT department at HP is eliminating telecommuting. Apparently the new head of the division, Randy Mott, who "is regarded by Wall Street as a mastermind of operational efficiency based on his days as chief information officer at Wal-Mart Stores and Dell" doesn't like telecommuting so he's forcing everybody in his division to work from an office. This is an excellent example of one person changing the lives of many other people. Sure, some people abuse telecommuting, but many others thrive working from home. In this age of rising commuting costs, cheaper and more efficient communication tools, and people who flee expensive urban environments, telecommuting makes a lot of sense. Banishing it outright show a complete lack of understanding from this "mastermind of operational efficiency". But if you have power, you can abuse it. And it's only appropriate that HP, an early supporter of telecommuting, would ban it now, it's all part of the ebb and flow of life.

Howard Milano

2006-06-03T12:11:00.000-07:00

Let this be a lesson for everybody who has email at work: your boss is very likely reading your emails. Yeah, yeah, I have heard all the arguments about you're getting paid to work, your email at work doesn't belong to you, your boss has every right to read your emails. Still, it's significant how little freedom you retain, all for a paycheck. You have to dress properly at work, you have to spend much of your time there, you can't play games or surf the web for a few minutes to relax in fear of getting fired, you have to be very careful about what you say and how you treat people in fear of discrimination, and you better think many times before you email because everybody is likely reading over your shoulders. It's my favorite management style, manage by fear and intimidation. My advice: get a gmail account and access it with https. Makes it just a tad harder for your boss to read your email.

Howard Milano

2006-06-02T20:24:00.000-07:00

Some people are proposing implanting RFID chips into immigrants and guest workers. Excellent idea, isn't it. No, this would be an invasion of privacy for citizens, of course, but for all those new folks who want to enter the U.S., this is just a great way to keep track of them. RFID chips have been implanted in animals for years, it's only a small step from animals to immigrants and guest workers. This will not do anything to relieve the problem of illegal or undocumented aliens (can't implant those chips if you don't know where those aliens are), but anybody not born in the U.S. is a suspected terrorist, and RFID chips will be great for instant identification. It's easy to imagine a new world with RFID readers at all border crossings, airports, train, bus and metro stations , libraries, department stores, and more. I'm sure 7-11 and circle-k stores will be happy to install readers. Citizens will get chips during passport or driver's license renewals (despite privacy concerns). We'll finally all know where and who everybody else is at any time!

Howard Milano

2006-06-01T23:33:00.000-07:00

The U.S. military in Iraq will have to go to ethics training to become more ethical and moral so they can fight a more sensitive, ethical war. I'm sorry, but this makes me laugh out loud. Here is the big bully America fighting a first strike war that is turning into an endless maintenance job shepherding Iraq towards an unwanted democracy. No wonder the soldiers are getting antsy, it's grueling hot there, they're not much fighting but more patrolling, they're slowly being picked off by roadside bombers and other underground fighters, they're hated by lots of natives, and the best part is that this will go on for many more years to come. Now the top commanders decided that the solution is to make ethical, sensitive soldiers. Yes, we train you to fight and kill, we involve you in a ill-planned war, we turn you into glorified security guards, and now you're going to be Mr. nice guy! Perhaps the U.S. should have thought about this before starting the war, it's kind of immoral and unethical to start a first strike war.

Howard Milano

2006-05-30T22:38:00.000-07:00

It's exciting to see how the world is changing. Travelers to Russia will soon have to submit to lie detector tests, where they have to answer some questions while being scrutinized by a "truth verifier". Now, the publishing date of the article was pretty close to April Fool's day, but even if it's a joke, it's a surprisingly believable joke. Shoe removals and other security checks are all the rage nowadays. Air travel has become a chore and even a scare. Airlines have to report details of all passengers aboard U.S. bound flights to the U.S. government within 15 minutes of take off. A movie was made about one of the September 11 planes downed by terrorists. While it's becoming more scary, expensive, and bothersome to fly, more and more people fly. It's called change, and humans excel at change.

Howard Milano

2006-05-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

The situation in Afghanistan keeps slowly getting worse, and it worries me sometimes even more than the Iraq fiasco. I think we all thought years ago that the Taliban were defeated and pretty much erased from the world, but surprise, they are alive and well and gaining new strengths in Afghanistan. The Taliban are up to their same old tricks, suppressing women, intimidating people, killing disobedient people, all in the name of some ultra strict interpretation of the Koran. The current situation in Afghanistan shows that George Bush's first strike wars on Afghanistan and Iraq are not exactly the grand success George claims they are. And that means the U.S. will be at war for a long time to come, paid for by the tax dollars collected from its citizens.

Howard Milano

2006-05-15T20:20:00.000-07:00

Sony's Playstation 1 and 2 were great game machines when they came out, and PS2 continues to excite a lot of people. Part of the allure of the Playstations was their low price, great performance, and abundance of games. Now we might be seeing the fall of the Playstation dynasty. The PS3 is late, Microsoft's new XBox 360 will be out for a year by the time PS3 ships. Sony intends to sell the PS3 for $499 - $599, much more than the XBox, and much more than most people, including myself, would ever pay for a game machine. The PS3 will feature a Blu-ray DVD player, which is expensive, and it might be already obsolete by the time PS3 ships if Blu-ray loses the HD-DVD war. There will be a lack of games for the PS3 because Sony has been slow with releasing the developer's kit. It seems Sony's arrogance, gained from its position of market leader, is now causing bad business decisions. It will be amusing to see this unfold. My guess is that Sony will lose lots of money and market share after releasing the PS3.

Howard Milano

2006-05-12T08:09:00.000-07:00

Politics is such a dirty, dishonest business. Bush is being asked to explain the collection of domestic phone data, and on and on he goes about how the government and its spy agencies have nothing but the best in mind regarding the citizens (whose phone conversations are being recorded), how it's all about the hunt of "Al Qaeda and their known affiliates" (citizens are assumed to be Al Qaeda but will not be taken into custody as long as their phone conversations stay tame), and how the citizen's privacy is "fiercely protected". That's what I love best, Bush tries to whitewash any spying on citizens with the reasoning that any data collected will be fiercely protected . Well, hello! Bank robbers will fiercely protect the money they just stole from the vault. Fierce protection of the results of your labors doesn't make your labors legal or ethical. In the end it all doesn't matter, the government and its spy agencies will do whatever they want at any time, the citizens have mostly no clue what really goes on.

2006-05-07T20:34:00.000-07:00

What is this with celebrities, their drugs, and their solutions to their drug problems? Now we have Rep. Patrick Kennedy who crashed his car, didn't get a sobriety test, and instantly fled into a drug rehab clinic. Patrick keeps blaming it on the prescription drugs, but people wonder if it's not just plain drinking too much. Just recently Rush Limbaugh was in the news again, remember how he always ranted against drugs, then he got caught and he did the rehab dance and now he feels he can be against drugs again since he got purified in rehab. Patrick Kennedy will happily continue in his politician's job and Rush will stay on radio. Somehow a trip to the rehab clinic washes everything clean. I don't see the same results for people who struggle and go to AA meetings. A factory worker caught drinking excessively is terminated from his job. I guess we simply can't fire every celebrity who does too many drugs, we wouldn't have many left.

Howard Milano

2006-05-04T19:15:00.000-07:00

Salary.com had the results of their annual "What should Mom earn" research, and their estimated salary for Mom is: $134,121 annually!! That is more, by the way, then 99% of the U.S. population makes, in fact, it's more than I make. Not to belittle Mom's work, but the proposed salary seems a bit high. If you dive deeper into the Salary.com research, you'll find out that the salary is based on a whopping 92 hours per week with 50+ hours paid at around 2 times normal pay. A large chunk of the pay is from Mom's "CEO" work, now what does that mean? Mom gets paid liberally for doing the laundry, driving around, poking around on her computer and being psychologist (I guess that means listening and giving advice). In fact, almost all Mom's waking hours are somehow translated into good money. Most other workers get paid for 8 hours a day, but they have to spend the rest of their day unpaid, which can include driving around, poking around on the computer, cooking, cleaning, doing laundry, listening, etc. I would say that Salary.com had a good idea, assigning a salary to Mom's work, but the final result is totally out of proportion, and in fact belittles the work that most other people do for a living.

Howard Milano

2006-05-01T07:23:00.000-07:00

An insightful article with a strange cast talking about a dream of many people. Pretty much everybody who listens to FM radio hates the commercials that are probably even more annoying than T.V. commercials since there are no visuals to distract you. The article talks about a reclusive radio station owner who runs a station that plays random selections from a huge personal music library, all uninterrupted by commercials. That's the good news. The bad news is that the fan base is growing, and some fans are slowly invading and eroding the radio station owner's life. There is a giant disconnect here: the station owner plays non-commercial music for his own benefit with no higher motive of changing FM radio, and in fact he is a strong believer in commercial FM, while the fans believe the new age of FM has arrived and there is a savior (the station owner calls himself 'guru') who is jump starting the new world of commercial free FM. The fans are haunting the station owner, and the station owner is considering moving and abandoning the commercial free station. An interesting story about us humans.

Howard Milano

2006-04-29T19:55:00.000-07:00

Mexico is legalizing possession and usage of limited amounts of drugs for personal use. A wise move, that the U.S. will hopefully one day follow. It is ridiculous that so much money is spend on arresting and prosecuting citizens for small amounts of drugs. For awhile you could get up to 20 years jail time in the U.S. if you had any amount of marijuana, a sure way to fill up the jails quickly. It's the alcohol prohibition all over again, and it has been shown that the alcohol prohibition was a complete failure. The U.S. is so backwards in their attitudes towards marijuana that the medical use of marijuana is mostly forbidden. I cannot imagine the cold-heartedness of the politicians who keep voting against the medical use of marijuana, they vote against the relief of pain of sick people. The U.S. government should finally grow up and get over their drug paranoia, legalize and tax (!) drugs for personal use, prosecute and jail big drug dealers.

Howard Milano

2006-04-20T19:19:00.000-07:00

Well, we can all relax now. Wal-Mart has decided to keep growing, basically they don't care if people are against their virtually unlimited growth, if the public keeps buying at Wal-Mart, Wal-Mart will keep creating more buying opportunities. I have to say up-front that I don't particularly like Wal-Mart, and I don't shop at Wal-Mart, in fact, I have never even been inside one of their stores. However, this is America, we have a business driven economy, if you can make money, go for it. Wal-Mart has gotten a lot of flack lately because they treat their workers not in the best way, meaning the wages are low, and most workers don't have benefits. I do resent Wal-Mart for their poor worker treatment, but they are not alone in this. One of the ground rules of this American capitalism is to make as much money as you can, and that basically means you take the money away from others. I guess we're all waiting for Wal-Mart to grow so large (they are already the world's largest retailer) that they will collapse under their own weight. I hope that will be before everybody in the U.S. is either retired, working at McDonalds (everybody needs fast food) or working at Wal-Mart.

Howard Milano

2006-04-18T14:33:00.000-07:00

Ah.., we live in a golden time. The three headlines when I opened up Yahoo news were: "Bush won't rule out nuclear strike on Iran", "Rumsfeld: I won't quit", and "Oil hits record above $72 on Iran fears". Draw your own conclusions. My own conclusion is that, given Bush's record up to now, there is a fair chance he will indeed drop some nuclear bombs on Iran, which will cause oil to go much, much higher, and will make Rumsfeld forgotten by everybody in the subsequent mess (read World War III). Nuclear weapons are such a crude, outdated way of fighting, about all nuclear weapons do is create a waste land and piss a lot of nations and people off. A nuclear bomb might have worked in Japan, at the end of a terrible war with both sides exhausted from an ugly fight, but it's different in Iran. Dropping a nuclear bomb in Iran will cause global political relations to go sour between the U.S. and virtually every other nation, and the worst is that it will cause a wave of terrorism directed at the U.S. What does Bush figure, hit them with the worst weapon and they'll shut up? Very ignorant, Bush, to say the least.

Howard Milano

2006-04-17T20:01:00.000-07:00

It always amazes how hypocritical politicians can be. Georgia just passed a bill that severely restricts the rights of illegal aliens, and governor Sonny Perdue, before signing the bill, happily said: "It's our responsibility to ensure that our famous Georgia hospitality is not abused.." Famous hospitality, yes, but with strings attached. In fact, if we don't like you, or if you're here illegally, or basically, if you're not a friend or family, you can't enjoy our famous hospitality. Strange, hospitality usually means something like "kindness in welcoming guests or strangers." The famous Georgia hospitality is more "kindness in welcoming people that are here legally and who don't hire illegal aliens." Looks like strangers and guests better carry an affidavit of legality from Home Land Security before venturing to Georgia.

Howard Milano