John Mccain Does Not Support The Troops

Great segment from The Daily Show last night. Starts out with Bush playing buddy to some future officers. John Stewart wonders, would we love him, if he hadn't been fucking things up for the last seven years? If we never got into war, if Dick Cheney was "never born", lol, but alas, he has been fucking things up for the last seven years, so his displays of nice guy image are probly not appropriate anyway as "Rome is burning", and the Emperor dines, is the famous line of that story.

He then moves onto the subject of the new GI Bill, and how Mccain has a major problem with it, citing the exact same study Mccain was quoting from. Apparently Mccain didn't actually read the whole thing, just took his talking point from Bush.

I thought the phone call interruption from Daily Show correspondent Rob Riggle was a little stupid, but the closing words from Stewart are goddamn spot-on. Mccain criticizes Obama for having never served in combat, but, oh yea, neither has Bush, or Cheney, (who John Mccain completely supports in everything they do or say), or most of his cabinet, or most of the Republican talking heads who love to shout how we must support the troops.

I actually applauded at the end of the segment. Sadly it is non "mainstream media" shows like John Stewart that are the only ones really doing their duty as journalists and speaking the truth about what a fucking hypocrite John Mccain is.

Big Night for Obama

The counting of all the votes in Indiana went far into the early morning hours, but results for yesterdays May 6 Democratic primarys in North Carolina and Indiana are now certain. It was a big night for Obama, and Hillary is now in a pretty tough spot.

The results in North Carolina were clear almost minutes after the polls closed, Obama won big there, by a clear margin of 14%. Indiana was deemed too close to call, and stayed that way until over 95% of the vote was counted. The final result was a victory for Hillary in Indiana, but a very slim one by only a 2% margin, making it one of the closest races so far this primary season, and quite possibly actually more of a victory for him then for her.

Obama's gains in delegates and votes last night have practically erased any gains Hillary earned out of the Pennsylvania primary, and depending on how you do the math, puts him squarely in the lead now even if both Florida and Michigan are made to count as is. Hillary has been insisting for weeks now that Florida and Michigan, both states results ruled not to count as a penalty for them breaking Democratic election rules and moving up their primarys, should both be counted, as is. Hillary did win both contests, but the legality of both states results have been the topic of much debate, as neither candidate was allowed to campaign in Florida, and Obama was not even present on the ballot in Michigan. Hillary has been going around making speeches for weeks now saying she is actually the clear leader for the nomination, but she has had to include Florida and Michigan in her counts to be able to claim that. A hearing has been set for May 31 before the Democratic rules board to decide on what exactly to do about Florida and Michigan, they should be made to count in some way, but how exactly thats going to happen without some kind of full do-over is at this point completely unclear.

Even so, last nights results have now put a big dent into Hillarys hope for the outcome of that meeting. Even if Florida and Michigan are made to count, as is without any kind of do-over, its now not going to be of much help to her. During last nights primary coverage on MSNBC, Tim Russert went as far as to say the race is now over, that Hillary can not win now, and Obama is now the clear Democratic nominee for president. In another interesting fact, Hillary was scheduled to appear on two different morning talk shows this post primary morning, and just canceled both appearances late last night. Things not looking too good for Hillary right now, and apparently shes in no rush to talk about it either. Is the race really over now? Probly not. I have little doubt that Hillary plans to fight this to the bitter end, but the deck is definitely not stacked in her favor now.

If you missed it, I would recommend viewing Obama's North Carolina victory speech from last night. I think it is actually one of his best speeches yet. The entire 21 minute speech can be viewed below.

Iron Man : My Thoughts

Went and saw the new movie Iron Man tonight. Wasn't really sure if I wanted to see it in the theater at all, looked freakin awesome from its trailers no doubt, but ehh looks like your typical big summer blockbuster action flick. Read some reviews this morning tho, they seem to be pretty flowing with positive for it, FirstShowing.net gave it a straight 10, so figured well if its really that good then I have to see it.

Robert Downey Jr. and Gwyneth Paltrow were both very very good in it I should say first, I've got to give it that. They were both perfect castings for their characters, and really had good chemistry between them. Downey Jr. especially, delivers a stellar performance, that really saves the film from being just average I think.

Overall, I'd say it was exactly what I was expecting, your typical big summer blockbuster action flick, and not really much more. I guess I was just actually kind of expecting more after the reviews I read. It was a very good film, don't get me wrong, but I felt it was pretty standard for your big summer movie season action flick. Take a decent story line, add loads of fantastic visual effects, stuff blowing up, and don't forget the plenty of little lines here n there that give you a laugh too. A good director could pretty much make one of these summer action movies by just following a checklist. Iron Man adheres to the standard big action flick checklist pretty well. Its a very good film, and definitely a bit above par for the type, but ehh, I was just expecting a bit more.

I wouldn't give it a 10, no, definitely not, maybe a 8.5.

SPOILERS BELOW

After thinking about it a bit more too, what the film really needed was a better villain. Spoiler warning, it was the vice president of his own company, that was selling weapons to terrorists secretly, and paid those terrorists to capture Stark and try to kill him. He builds his own suit once he figures out what Stark is up to with his suit, and they battle it out in the end. He doesn't even really become "the villain" until he puts on the other suit, which doesn't happen until about 20 minutes before the end. I think actually, yea, that specifically is what let me down a little about this film, what a weak villain.

MoveOn.org McCain Ad - Mission Accomplished

DNC McCain Ads

The Democratic National Committee has released two television ads concerning presidential nominee John McCain.

They pretty much speak for themselves, using McCain's own words. Hes tried to spin them of course, tried to "explain" what exactly he meant by 100 years. He thinks in 100 years we could still have a troop presence in Iraq, just as we still do in South Korea, and Germany, long after the wars have ended.

McCain just doesn't get it. The American people do not want us to remain in Iraq, period. The Iraqi people themselves want us to get the hell out. If McCain seriously thinks that in 100 years Iraq could be in peace, that American soldiers would no longer be targeted, that car bombs would no longer be going off daily, then he has lost touch with reality. Iraq will never be in peace as long as our soldiers remain there.

I should also remind people that McCain has no healthcare plan whatsoever, thinks our healthcare system is pretty much fine the way it is, supports the Bush tax cuts for the rich, even wants to make them permanent, and has flip flopped on the crucial issue of torture, and now supports it. Hes tried to spin that too, but his vote speaks for itself. A bill was sent before the Senate in March to ban the use of waterboarding by all US agencies and the military, since Bush has claimed that waterboarding is not really torture, the bill would ban the use of waterboarding, and put a stop to it, period. McCain voted against the bill, and then supported Bush in his vetoing of the bill altogether. He can try to spin it all he wants, but his vote speaks for itself, McCain, who was tortured himself in Vietnam, now supports torture.

As bad as I think Hillary would be as the next president, oh boy am I certain that McCain would be a hundred times worse.

Hillary on the Attack Again

Vista 64bit

The new webcam I bought (Post) fully supports Windows Vista, and Vista 64bit too. I've been using Vista Ultimate, 32bit, off and on since before it was even out and still in beta, it really doesn't deserve half the criticism people give it. Yes it does use more system resources and RAM then XP does, and yes a lot of people will have problems with some old hardware not really supported anymore, but if you're on a decent PC built within the last three years or so, and have at least 1 GB (gigabyte) of RAM, then you really won't have too many problems with Vista.

I've been wanting to try 64bit Vista for a while now. I'm on a Pentium D processor, its no Core 2 Duo, but its a dual-core, and its a 64bit processor. For people that don't understand what I'm even talking about, or what 64bit means, basically, for the average person reading this right now, you are more then likely using a 32bit OS (operating system). A 64bit OS can process double the amount of data per clock cycle, and while a 32bit OS can only support up to 4 GB's of RAM, a 64bit OS can support up to 32 GB's of RAM and 16 TB's (terabyte) of virtual memory.

Understand all that? No? Well anyway, a 64bit OS running on a 64bit processor is just naturally faster. You have to have a processor that is capable of running 64bit code of course, and, heres the stopper for most people, you have to have native 64bit hardware drivers for components, no exceptions. So your video card, your sound card, your ethernet NIC or WiFi card, your printers, your webcams, all actual pieces of hardware, must have actual 64bit drivers available. Software and programs can be emulated, meaning you can run programs designed for 32bit on 64bit with little or no problems at all, but not hardware drivers, they must be native 64bit supported.

So when I got my new webcam, and saw that it has drivers for 64bit too, I started thinking about giving 64bit a try. All of my other hardware is 64bit supported too and ready to go. So I obtained a Vista 64bit install image, reformatted my drive, and made the switch.

All set up now, all my favorite programs installed, the OS configured the way I like it, and I must say, I am quite pleased with my 64bit experience thus far. I have had zero problems yet really. I can really see the increased performance of the 64bit OS too, everything just feels faster, more fluid, even 32bit applications and programs, that are run in a 32bit emulation layer, are just faster now. My favorite anti-virus program, Avast, is even native 64bit supported (Info), and really runs better, faster, and uses less resources then it did on 32bit Vista. My favorite disk defragger, PerfectDisk, also defrags MUCH faster then it did on 32bit Vista.

Consider me a 64bit user for good, I don't think I'll ever want to have to switch back to a 32bit OS. If I do run across some program that simply will not function under a 64bit OS, then I will just have to deal with it and find another program.

SightSpeed

Speaking of webcams, I should mention a new program I discovered. I've used a few different programs and messengers over the years to have webcam video sessions over. Some work better then others, but I've never really been too happy with any of them quality wise. So last week I was thinking that there must be something better out there, something designed specifically for webcam video sessions. I finally stumbled across a website mentioning and recommending this program called SightSpeed. (Homepage)

SightSpeed is the award-winning provider of Internet video chat and voice calling for friends and family, and video conferencing solutions for businesses.

Our patented video technology ensures you get the best possible video and sound quality every time, unlike other online video services. SightSpeed offers the highest-quality, full-motion 30 frames per second video with clear audio and no annoying delay.

SightSpeed’s patented technology adjusts the size of video/audio bits while you’re in call, so that you get the best call possible given the connection speeds at hand.

There is a totally free version, which contains no spyware or nagware, I would not recommend something that did, and it really works as advertised. Its been my experience with other messenger's webcam support that a slightly slow frame rate is to be expected. Like if you were to wave your hand in front of the cam, the other person would see only segmented movement. Video sessions using SightSpeed are truly high framerate, real time. If you have a webcam and like to have video sessions with another person that does too, get them to install SightSpeed too and enjoy the quality.

Slight disclaimer: As it points out on the programs website;

Broadband service is recommended over other internet access services. You AND your participants’ connection speeds directly impact your video experience. The lowest connection speed among your participants is the speed at which your call will take place. Slower connection speeds results in fuzzy or paused video AND choppy audio.

My experience with the program thus far conducted between two people who both have decent broadband internet connections. Don't expect much if someones on dial-up.

New Webcam

I bought a new webcam a week or so ago. The one I had before, a Logitech Quickcam Chat if I remember correctly, was a total piece of garbage to say the truth. It was a cheap cam when I bought it and wasn't expecting much, but even taking that into account, it was a piece of garbage, and eventually wound up being tossed into the garbage too. The image quality was very grainy, and just downright horrible really, with extremely poor low light performance, had to turn on about four lights to achieve an even viewable image, and the provided Logitech drivers for it were just, repulsive. It was about a 70 MB driver package, that ran about four Windows startup/background processes all the time even when not in use even when the cam not even plugged in, and I just really hated it. I dreaded the thought of someone asking me to use it because I just hated installing it so much.

Anyway, sorry to lay the hate on Logitech, but that product deserves it. So I was looking for a new webcam last week, and not feeling like spending upwards of $60 for a good one, and came upon this particular webcam on Newegg, the Hercules Deluxe Optical Glass (Newegg product page | Hercules product page), with a very pleasing under $25 price. At first glance, I thought, for that price it has got to be total crap too. But, hmm, an all glass lens, and reading the handful of customer reviews it had, people seemed pretty damn happy with it, every review there is mentioning its good image quality too. So I figured what the heck, I'll take a gamble on it, if its total crap I haven't wasted that much money and I'll bite the bullet then and pay a high price for a good one.

Man am I happy I took the chance and bought this. After using it for a day I left another Newegg review for it too.

Much better then I even expected
Pros: Very small. Great image quality. Good driver package.
Cons: None so far.
Other Thoughts: Wasn't actually expecting that much from this, but I'm pleasantly surprised. Image quality is veryyy good for the price, I've had some webcams that cost more with much worse grainy image quality. Driver package is also very pleasing, runs one single background process that also isn't absolutely necessary and can be disabled for run at startup, some other major brand webcam's drivers are quite large and run 4 or 5 startup/background processes. Am veryy pleased with this webcam, can not do better for the price.

Not much more to say then that. I love this webcam, the best I've ever owned. I love the four little LED lights on it too, that can be toggled on and off in the cam's controls. When turned on they are VERY bright, and completely negate the need to turn on any extra lights for use in a dark room. They're not even that necessary to have turned on tho too, as the cam's low light performance is also very good. I keep one small desk light turned on at night, and that alone is plenty of light for this cam to produce a good image. I also really love its size, it is VERY small. This would be the perfect webcam to just throw in a laptop bag and carry around. If in need of a good, and cheap, webcam, you really can't do much better then the Hercules Deluxe Optical Glass.

Caught in a Lie

From MSNBC :

Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign said she "misspoke" when saying last week she had landed under sniper fire during a trip to Bosnia as first lady in March 1996. She later characterized the episode as a "misstatement" and a "minor blip."

During a speech last Monday on Iraq, she said of the Bosnia trip: "I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base."

According to an Associated Press story at the time, Clinton was placed under no extraordinary risks on the trip. And one of her companions, comedian Sinbad, told The Washington Post he has no recollection either of the threat or reality of gunfire.

She "misspoke"? Try wildly exaggerated, and now shes backpedaling because she got caught. To her original wildly exaggerated story, and her half assed attempt to talk her way out of it, I say, she is soo full of shit.