Hypocrisy Poo!

First, let me say, and read this carefully, I believe in freedom of religion and freedom of speech and I would put my life on the line to protect those rights for anyone. I also have absolutely nothing against Muslims. However, news coming out of Australia today is really ticking me off.

Apparently a senior Muslim Cleric in Australia compared women who do not wear a headscarf to "uncovered meat" who invite rape. Excuse me?! I wonder how he thinks the rest of the world should react to this? This man belongs to a religion, is a leader of a religion, whose members conducted violent protests over CARTOONS!!! So, based on his suggestion that non-Muslim women should be raped, the rest of the world should have WHAT reaction?

I think the man is lucky to be alive and he should quickly drop to his knees and thank Allah that the rest of the world is more forgiving of stupidity than he and many other members of his faith. I also think that Australia should deport him to the dark depths of a cave somewhere in Afghanistan.

Note: Maybe this moron is just trying to become the Rush Limbaugh of the Muslim world? Yeah, what the world really needs is another idiot engaging his mouth before his brain.

More Microsoft Poo

This morning I hear that Microsoft's IE7 has gone final (release the balloons!). So, since I had the latest beta on my computer, I decided to upgrade. Now, I use Firefox 99% of the time and usually open IE when I either absolutely have to or I am beta testing something and need to test it under IE. Lately, I have been moving farther and farther away from Microsoft products and my update of IE7 clearly illustrates why.

Somewhere deep in the bowels of Microsoft, in a dark, dusty, cobweb infested room filled with old computers (probably Apple IIc's) lives the creature that long ago decided that every single thing you change on a Windows computer should require a restart of the machine. No, not a logoff, a shutdown and restart. Why? No one knows and the restart troll ain't givin' up the company secret. So, here's what it took to upgrade to IE7 final:

First, I go to Softpedia.com for the download, thus avoiding the Windows Genuine Advantage validation of my operating system. Do I fear being caught with a bootleg copy of Windows? No, it's legal and has been validated many times, far too many times and I'm sick of it; so I download from sites that don't require this silly, irritating waste of my time. Besides.....well, you'll see.

Next, I start the program and it uninstalls the old version of IE7. Wait, isn't this an update? Why uninstall all of the old version? Was it written from scratch? Hold on! What's this? A restart for the uninstall.?! Okay, I guess we gotta flush the poo out of the system.

After the restart, the install program continues with, yes you guessed it, a validation of my operating system! That's right, I'm such a notorious criminal that my operating system had to be checked by the Office of WindowsLand Security not once, but twice! That's what I get for thinking I could put one over on the richest man in the world. Silly me, thinking I could dodge validation. I should be locked in a dungeon with Clippy (I see you're trying to breath, would you like me to help remove the noose?).

So, now that I'm all valid and Bill's Billions are safe, IE7 installs and finally finishes with...yes...drum roll please...a RESTART! Moments later the machine starts anew, loads my previously unknown personal settings and welcomes me to the bright new future of IE7 Final, which I promptly close so I can open Firefox and check my Gmail.

Would someone at Mozilla or Google please write an operating system. Wait, Macs don't usually require much more than a logout for program installation and Apple doesn't treat it's customers like criminals. Maybe my next update should be from a Mac Mini to a G5.

Are We Too Stupid To Vote?

This from Techdirt:

The situation in Maryland with Diebold voting machines already looked pretty bad with no real fix in sight. However, they're apparently even worse than we had assumed before. Tim Lee, over at The Technology Liberation Front points us to a story on Avi Rubin's blog, posting an email from a Chief Judge for the recent problematic election. Turns out that one of the Diebold machines at his site recorded zero votes on the memory card for the election, despite the fact that fifty-five people were logged voting at that machine. There was no warning or error message on the machine that would have, you know, let anyone know that the machine shouldn't be used or their votes wouldn't be recorded. While in the end, they were able to recover the votes by looking at the additional on-board memory (not the memory card) on the machine, Rubin points out all of the problems with this method, including the fact that they're reliant on Diebold to recover these votes and provide an accurate tally. Once again, this seems to highlight just how many problems there are with these voting machines and should make everyone question why we're rushing them into the voting booths so quickly, without adequate tests.

Now, if you listen to some politicians, you will hear them saying that many people are too stupid to have the right to vote. This will be the excuse they give when they finally get busted for rigging elections. Well, that and God told them to cheat. However, how wrong can they be if the American people are stupid enough to let this system stand. These voting machines are built by a company that has promised to deliver votes for one party, and has, in fact, contributed 100% of their campaign contributions (nearly $500,000) to that same party. Centuries from now, historians will shake their heads in astonished disbelief at the very notion that the citizens of a democracy would allow a voting system like this to be responsible for even one stolen ballot.

Here's a prediction, and I hope I'm wrong, but I predict that the Republicans will maintain control of both houses of Congress. There will be many elections that they win in the 52%-48% range. They will then explain that this once again proves that pre-election polling by the liberal press is completely unreliable. Next summer, the Exxon administration will raise the price of our oil addiction to $4.00 a gallon to make up for "lost revenue" incurred because some Iranian Mullah had irritable bowels in the summer of 2006. Middle-class Americans, trying to raise families without health insurance or retirement benefits, will take their $350 tax cut and sign it over to their local gas station. The few who actually complain will be labeled as "un-American sissy-boys" by Dick Cheney and smugly reminded by Turd Blossom that "they got what they voted for." Bush will remain clueless and Kim Jong Il will remain completely insane.

Note (Nov. 8): I've never been so happy to be wrong. Looks like the Democrats may have some control now. Let's hope they do a good job and actually govern the country instead of trying to force an ideological agenda that the people don't want. The Republicans are learning the hard way that that is the wrong way to go.