fw - advice on PC backups

Jamie Zawinski advice on PC backups.

Your hard disk will eventually fry, so a backup process is essential for pain minimization.

Don't use your work email for nonwork purposes

BTW, you may consider not sending nonwork emails from your work email.

I know a guy from tennis in Atlanta. He was fired from his Lockheed Martin engineering job for merely forwarding an e-mail that he received from another Lockheed guy, to a few friends. HR made an example out of him. The email had a racial joke. I forget what it was, but it wasn't even racist, not even at the level of a Mencia/Chappelle joke. Not close to Imus, & definitely not even anywhere close the actually racist level of Weiner "Savage" or mAnn Coulter. Again he just forwarded the joke email, it wasn't even his email.

That example shook me from ever wanting the use work email for nonwork purposes.

Do NOT send non-work e-mail from you work e-mail account

You should NOT use your work e-mail for non-work purposes.

People have gotten fired for doing so.

Check out this example of this douche-bag kid from the financial services industry.

I actually know a guy from tennis that got fired from his engineering gig at Lockheed Martin for MERELY FORWARDING a joke non-PC e-mail from another Lockheed guy. It looks like HR chose to make an example out of dude.

Gmail & Yahoo are free e-mail yall dee dee dees, use them instead for non-work purposes.

USA economic ELE - interview with Gov Acct David M. Walker

The US Comptroller General David M. Walker of the GAO is interviewed by the BBC. Note - Walker is a "career" government official that's been at the GAO since 1998, he's not a Gee Dubbz hack like Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez. In other words (no Gee Dubbz), Walker is actually worth listening to.

The US Government national debt (aka public debt) is at $8.8 Trillion. Using a ballpark figure of the US population of 300 Million, this means each of us Americans has a $29K per capita debt!

But the current national debt is not the economic ELE.

The economic ELE is that the Baby Boomer retirement, will increase government spending due to all of the boomers' Social Security & Medicaid costs. Note that there are relatively more Baby Boomers (40s - 60s "babies") than Generation X & Y (70s - 00s "babies"), so the ratio of current workers to retired workers will decrease dramatically.

Walker says these 3 things will inevitably happen to address this fiscal crisis.
1 cut retirement-related benefits - SSN, Medicaid, etc
2 cut other government spending
3 raise revenue/taxes

Walker didn't even mention other factors that I feel are quite possible
4 reduction in salary growth (or even salary reduction) in many American occupations due to offshore outsourcing to Asia
5 raising energy costs to 2X+ current level due to somewhat of a "peak oil" type situation

Even worse, this doesn't factor in an actual ELE which hopefully won't but might occur, such as
6 global economic depression
7 severe "crash" (say 30%+) in stock market or house market
8 public health crisis like avian flu
9 WMD-type terrorist attack which forces a quarantine of a major city for a decade or more

Bottom line is make sure you & your family save a lot of money, as you can't really rely on the US government or economy, word to Hurricane Katrina.

Damn I never thought Prince's 1999 song would be used in retrospect, but damn it's true. 1999 USA was awesome, I would "party like it's 1999" if the USA economic & geopolitical situation could return to that relative golden era!

Aterciopelados "Cancion Protesta", & the status of Freedom of Speech in 2007 USA

Shout out to Atreciopleados, the Colombian rock group.

Their album "Oye" was one of my favorites of 2006. Those who like rock, or like latin music, or like music with positive lyrics, should check this out, even if they don't speak spanish. It's mainly rock but has elements of the music of the indigenous Colombian people ("Native Americans" in US lingo).



During the Gee Dubbz regime, Dubbz has often made ridic, un-democratic, un-patriotic statements such as

"if you're not with us, you're with the terrorists"

In turn the timid bitchmade Democratic politicians, with a few exceptions like Russ Feingold, are usually too lame & timid to point out that this is obviously undemocratic.

There is a quote by Thomas Jefferson or another of the US "founding fathers". I can't source it, but it something like

"if the government is acting against the interest of the public, it's your duty to speak against it. Actually the ones who stay silent in such a situation are the ones who are unpatriotic, not the ones that speak out"

BTW, using Dubbz logic, the following remarkable humans if living in 2007 US would prolly be labeled by Dubbz and his WC crew as "with the terrorists", just for practicing their free speech and civil disobedience.
Jesus Christ
Martin Luther
Martin Luther King Jr
Mahatma Gandhi
Nelson Mandela

There are some American politicians, editorial writers, talking heads whose heart is in the right place on these issues of democracy, free speech, and civil disobedience.

Unfortunately, they don't have the eloquence of Aterciopleados singer Andrea Echeverri. Check the lyrics of the chorus of the song "Cancion Protesta" (eg Protest Song) from "Oye". It succinctly and quickly lays out an intellectual ethering of a response to Dubbz' assertion.

Suena otra cancion protesta
pero no la llaman terrorista
no es que no sean patriota
es que traiga otro punto de vista

For my peeps que no hablan espanol, here's the rough translation

A protest song is playing
but don't call it terrorist
it's not that it's not patriotic
it just has a different point of view

The verbose no-campaign-skills-having, foot-in-his-mouth, John Kerry prolly could not express this view in an hour or less!

Check the live clip of "Cancion Protesta" from a concert in Spain. Before the song Echeverri explains she's referring to Colombia and the government's "Plan Colombia" program, part of which is ethering the environment of some beautiful rural areas of Colombia by spraying ridic quantities of toxic chemicals to destroy coca crops.

Although Echeverri is talking about Colombia, the same logic is relevant to the USA.

Folks like Cindy Sheehan who protest the Iraq war are NOT UNPATRIOTIC, in fact they are the MOST PATRIOTIC for exercising free speech against Dubbz' Iraqi policy. In Sheehan's view, and most Americans' view, Dubbz' Iraqi policy doesn't benefit the public, the average Joe in the US or Iraq. So Sheehan is an American patriot for expressing her view, word to MLK Jr.

PSA from Belize, just say no to meth

The dude Belize has a good PSA article on meth, including a personal anecdote of his.

article - Giuliani = authoritarian narcissist

Salon article on Giuliani.

Giuliani is a horrible candidate for 2008 President.

I want to strongly vote against Giuliani, while at the same time I don't feel strongly about voting for any particular candidate.

Don't know too much about Giuliani's policies, that's not what offends me.

The guy's work experience doesn't bother me either. Being a mayor of NYC is an impressive job for domestic experience. Also since NYC is so international, it actually has some foreign experience element as well, considering the 9/11 attacks, and relations with the UN Headquarters.

What offends me about Giuliani is that he's an AUTHORITARIAN EGOMANIAC.

After 8 yrs of "The Decider" Gee Dubbz, what we Americans need the most is a President who restores the rule of law, respects the US Constitution, habeas corpus, and respect the Separation of Powers and the equal power of the Judiciary & Legislative branches of government to their Executive branch.

It seems that from this article that Giuliani could be the worst of Gee Dubbz (egomaniac, power hungry) & Dick Cheney (smart evil guy, supporting unlimited dictator-style power for the President) combined in one sociopath evil man.

I almost feel like fake-registering as a Republican to vote for McCain in the primary just to help eliminate Giuliani. Unfortunately, my bro Lucho reminded me that the first few primary states decide the nomination anyways, & I don't live in any of those states.

Giuliani is a real threat to win. Even though the primaries are almost a year away, current polls suggest that Giuliani may win.

He's sonning the Republican nominees, leading the 2nd place candidate McCain by 40% - 20%.

In the hypothetical general election, he daughters Hillary Clinton 47-43, and is statistical tie to Obama 43-44.

Bottom line, fwd this article to your friends, tell folks about Giuliani, especially those that vote but don't really follow politics.

Bottom line, Giuliani is a dick (pause), we as Americans, hell the world for that matter, can't afford another 4+ years of a wanna-be dictator.

St. Patrick's Day PSA

Props to the homie I Fux, who has a PSA about St. Patrick's Day, & drinking & driving

Drinking & driving is bad m'k (c) South Park teacher

Choose 1 or more of these several options to avoid drinking & driving
1 If you're at a friend's house, sleep on the floor & drive home 5 hrs later in the morning sober
2 take a cab
3 take a nap in your car for 2 hrs to sober up
4 listen to 2 albums while chilling in your car. In this age of the IPod, that shouldn't be boring.

BTW St. Patrick's Day is in honor of an Irish Bishop & missionary who evangelized many Irish pagans to convert to Christianity. I would've guessed that dude was martyred or imprisoned by his enemies, but no he supposedly died in 493 naturally at the age of 120!

So if you can inspire a holiday that gives folks an excuse to drink, you will be revered 1.5 millenniums after you die. WTF!