A bit of Friday Fun. Here are some movie bloopers from 1936.

Bits and Pieces for the Week of February 21 - 27

Ten reasons to avoid talking on the phone. (Mike)

Myths about immigrants which most people incorrectly think are true. (Mike)

California's (*cough* *cough*) pristine environment is under attack by the Groperzenneger Administration along with the state legislature in an effort to stimulate the economy. (Mike)

The devastated California housing market won't be getting better anytime soon. (Mike)

This economic meltdown had a cause, Nobel Prize Winner in Economics, Joseph Stiglitz, reminds us how important it is to get history right. (7 of 6)

Mark Morford puts Tiger Woods recent "apology" into proper perspective:

"....Dick Cheney slithering forth and apologizing for being a cancerous, warmongering monster whose brutal profiteering and shriveled soul cost thousands of young American lives? The GOP stepping out and admitting they killed health care reform because they really wanted to ding the scary black president, and don't really give a flying crap about your sick and uninsured children? Now those would be remarkable public apologies. A comatose golfer saying he's sorry for nailing some hookers whilst his family rolls around in $500 million worth of Escalades, diamond-crusted teaspoons and Swiss ski chalets? Not a remarkable apology. Clear?...."

Bits and Pieces for the Week of February 14 - 20

This is like the sheep guarding the wolves... "The Senate and the Obama administration are nearing agreement on forming a council of regulators, led by the Treasury secretary, to identify systemic risk to the nation’s financial system..." (7 of 6)

A great story regarding the appreciation of Labor in this country... Founder of Bob's Red Mill Natural Foods transfers business to employees. (7 of 6)

From a new study... "The rate at which the oceans are becoming more acidic is greater today than at any time in tens of millions of years, according to a new study." (7 of 6)

The importance of the Fairness Doctrine. "...radio station licensees had the obligation to give listeners a reasonable opportunity for discussion of contrasting points of view on issues of public importance. This mechanism was called the Fairness Doctrine." Makes perfect sense. (7 of 6)

Will the capture of Taliban's #2 man be enough to shut Dick and Liz Cheney's pie holes? Probably not, but according to Newsweek from last summer, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar is the current de facto leader of the Taliban. (7 of 6)

Bits and Pieces for the Week of February 7 - 13

More oppression from Sheriff Joe Arpaio in Maricopa County, AZ. He hires another bu$h administration lawyer... "Kris Kobach... was John Ashcroft's top immigration adviser at the Justice Department... according to the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC)... He has also worked as a lawyer for the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), an anti-illegal immigration organization that SPLC lists as a nativist hate group." Sweet Jesus... (7 of 6)

Come on Harry Reid... grow a pair! The Senate tells Labor and Obama to go screw themselves.

Can't think of a City that deserves winning the Super Bowl more!! Way to go New Orleans!!

Bits and Pieces for the Week of January 31 - February 6

How to Fall 35,000 Feet—And Survive (Mike)

Iran finds a very expensive way to solve the country's animal overpopulation (Mike)

I've tried many internet radio sites. I find RadioTuna to be one of the easiest and fastest to use. (Mike)

A master of the art of parking in tight spaces. (Mike)

For those conservatives who think different, "Obama Largely Inherited Today’s Huge Deficits". (7 of 6)

With a sampling error of only +/- 2%, here is a new poll assessing how Republicans stand on today's social issues. Hint: it's worse than you can imagine. (Mike)

"President Obama will be doing another televised question-and-answer session tomorrow morning -- this one with the Senate Democratic Caucus." Will any Progressive Senators be asking him tough questions? (7 of 6)

Hell freezes over!! Sarah Palin and I agree on something, she wants Obama to fire Rahm Emanuel. I think it's needed for Rahm's right-center domestic policies... she feels it should be for, "...remarks he allegedly made about the intellectually disabled." Damn it Sarah, Rahm wasn't talking about you or your son... he was talking about us Liberals! (7 of 6)

If large real estate firms walk away from responsibilities and debt why shouldn't the small borrower? "Arizona law professor Brent White says the only thing standing between many
'underwater' homeowners and a better financial future is a misguided sense that walking away from a loan commitment is morally wrong." (7 of 6)

My previous posts about the iPad tablet gave both the pros and cons of the first model. Tablets in general, however, will quickly become a new part of most of our lives, iPad or not:

Why You'll Use a Tablet. Yes YOU! By Mike Elgan February 3, 2010 I know, I know. You've checked out the Apple iPad, and you're not impressed. You think it's a limited, pointless, overpriced unpocketable iPod for gullible trend whores drunk on Cupertino Kool-Aid. You despise its closed, proprietary platform, lack of built-in keyboard, missing camera, unremovable battery, no Flash support and monthly fee for AT&T 3G access. Besides, the sudden tablet craze is just an overhyped fad, right? It's easy to predict that tablets will be huge sellers. After all, even skeptics can believe that other people will get caught up in a marketing-driven trend. But I'm going to make an even bolder prediction. I'm going to predict that you, personally, will be using a tablet within 18 months. That's bold because if you're reading this Web site, you're probably far more technical and sophisticated than the average user. And you're probably a professional evaluator of computer equipment. Chances are, you're skeptical about hyped new fads, and have far better memory about the Next Big Things that never happened. But I think that if you're anti-tablet now, you'll change your tune once you see what's really on offer. Here are my 10 reasons why I believe that you'll be using a tablet within 18 months: 1. Tablets will become hobbyist dream gadgets. Love to tinker? Tablets will be ideal for that. The home automation crowd will go nuts with these things. And the tablet craze will be accompanied by powerful, simplified development tools. People will build tablet cradles into their car dashboards, and will use tablets for GPS map display, audio control, engine diagnostics and more. Tablets will serve as robot controllers, model airplane controllers and will function as the brains and interface for homemade smart appliances and devices. Why wouldn't you want to build your own Microsoft Surface-like smart coffee table? 2. They will be optimized for specific tasks. If you do those tasks, you'll want the optimized tablet. For example, aviation companies will use the new touch tablets for their "electronic flight bag" devices, because they can hold all the documentation, charts, tools and so on that pilots need, both private and professional. Education? Forget about it. Touch tablets are tailor made for K-12, as well as university education. Tablets with cameras will be useful as magnifiers, security-cam, nanny-cam and crib-cam monitors. Solutions providers will take the open systems and build proprietary, optimized applications that take advantage of the touch interfaces. 3. You will be compelled by apps we can't now predict. When personal computers first arrived, nobody thought we'd use them to do social networking. When graphical user interfaces first took over, few predicted we'd use them heavily for surfing a very graphical Web (since the Web didn't even exist then). When cell phones started becoming popular, we never imagined people would use them for capturing data with applications like Evernote. The same thing will happen with tablets. Nobody knows what the "killer apps" will be. It's very likely that something will be invented, designed or developed that will thrill you, and make you change your mind. 4. Tablets will have uses that don't involve replacing something you're already doing. Tablets are viewed now as hobbled netbooks or giant cell phones. In fact, they'll be used for totally unpredictable purposes that currently nobody now does with computers. For example, imagine if a tablet computer could function as a remote control. And image it had "presets" on it for, say, 12 of your favorite channels. Now imagine that instead of buttons with numbers on them, 12 "buttons" show live video of what was currently playing on each of those channels. 5. Tablets will be open. Touch tablets will come out optimized for operating systems ranging from closed (iPhone OS) to open (Linux) and everything in between. There will be a gazillion Android tablets. We'll see Windows and Windows Mobile tablets, and more. Take your pick. 6. Your company may buy one for you. While you're busy not buying a tablet for your home, your company will become increasingly likely to purchase them for your use at work. I believe companies like HP, IBM and others, as well as VARs, will add Linux- and Windows-based touch tablets to their lineups of IT equipment, and as part of larger solutions packages. They reason is... 7. Tablets will become ideal for IT pros. Data center staff use clipboards and documentation. Help desk staff need remote desktop capability and remote access to network tools. IT executives attend meeting after meeting. Everybody uses laptops. Tablets will do all this in a single package. Management tools will be optimized for touch user interfaces. And anyone who wants to use a physical keyboard and/or a mouse will be able to do so with the tablets. If you work anywhere in IT, you will be surrounded by tablet users. 8. Tablets will be better netbooks than netbooks. Tablets will soon be able to do 90% of what netbooks can do, but netbooks will be able to do only 50% of what tablets can do. I'm making these numbers up, but my point is that for most users, tablets will be able to replace netbooks, but netbooks won't be able to replace tablets. A universe of special purpose tablet apps will be created, while very few netbook-specific apps have been or will ever be built. A rational buying decision means that if you have to pick between buying a tablet or buying a netbook, you'll buy the tablet. 9. Tablets will get huge. Ten inches today, 13, 15, 21, 27 and more inches tomorrow. They'll be HD TVs you can bring anywhere. You'll use them for board games, arcade games, first-person shooter games. 10. Tablets will be cheap! It's a foregone conclusion that the tablets of tomorrow will be cheaper than the netbooks of today. It's the Law! (Moore's Law, to be specific.) You'd have to be pretty aggressively anti-tablet to not pay $200 for a gadget that will do so much. Skepticism is great. You have good reasons for dissing the Apple iPad. But the future is unpredictable, and the touch tablet concept is going to prove absolutely compelling. That's why I believe you'll be using one within 18 months. Who knows? Maybe you'll even use an iPad.

This is VERY disturbing news. I'm heavily invested in Google products (several email accounts, Googlegroups, several other Google services...). I don't want the eavesdropping-happy NSA anywhere near my Google stuff. Beginning of article:

Google to enlist NSA to help it ward off cyberattacks By Ellen Nakashima Thursday, February 4, 2010; A01 The world's largest Internet search company and the world's most powerful electronic surveillance organization are teaming up in the name of cybersecurity. Under an agreement that is still being finalized, the National Security Agency would help Google analyze a major corporate espionage attack that the firm said originated in China and targeted its computer networks, according to cybersecurity experts familiar with the matter. The objective is to better defend Google -- and its users -- from future attack. Google and the NSA declined to comment on the partnership. But sources with knowledge of the arrangement, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said the alliance is being designed to allow the two organizations to share critical information without violating Google's policies or laws that protect the privacy of Americans' online communications. The sources said the deal does not mean the NSA will be viewing users' searches or e-mail accounts or that Google will be sharing proprietary data. The partnership strikes at the core of one of the most sensitive issues for the government and private industry in the evolving world of cybersecurity: how to balance privacy and national security interests. On Tuesday, Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair called the Google attacks, which the company acknowledged in January, a "wake-up call." Cyberspace cannot be protected, he said, without a "collaborative effort that incorporates both the U.S. private sector and our international partners." But achieving collaboration is not easy, in part because private companies do not trust the government to keep their secrets and in part because of concerns that collaboration can lead to continuous government monitoring of private communications. Privacy advocates, concerned about a repeat of the NSA's warrantless interception of Americans' phone calls and e-mails after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, say information-sharing must be limited and closely overseen. "The critical question is: At what level will the American public be comfortable with Google sharing information with NSA?" said Ellen McCarthy, president of the Intelligence and National Security Alliance, an organization of current and former intelligence and national security officials that seeks ways to foster greater sharing of information between government and industry....

iPad: The Good

10 reasons Apple's iPad will be a hit with business users Author: Erik Eckel Apple’s new products generate ardent, obsessive, and fanatical coverage. Everyone from technology nerds to mass news media organizations trip over themselves attempting to be first introducing the world to Apple’s next big thing. Repeatedly revolutionizing the way people use computers (the Macintosh), listen to music (the iPod), and talk to one another (the iPhone) will do that (as well as generate $15.6B in quarterly revenue and $3.3B in net quarterly profit), which explains why the iPad debuted to such impressive fanfare last week. For all the things the iPad is (a perfect netbook, an outstanding eBook reader, a portable email device, etc.), there are a few features I’d have liked to see the iPad include. Imagine how the device would change the way we work if it included cellular telephone capability (you could talk using a Bluetooth headset), fancy keys you could feel (instead, the keyboard simply appears onscreen) and plentiful storage space (initial models will top out at 64GB). Regardless, the iPad will prove plenty popular with on-the-go business users. Here are the top 10 reasons why. 1: Email The iPad’s included Mail application makes it easy to join mobile users to Microsoft Exchange-powered email networks. Exchange provides the foundation for most small business email networks, so integration will prove almost automatic. Non-Exchange users will find Mail compatible with most every other commonly used email platform, as well. 2: Internet Base models include integrated 802.11 a/b/g/n wireless networking. Optional models include integrated 3G cellular data networking compatible with UMTS, HSDPA, GSM, and EDGE networks. As a result, business users will be able to access cloud-based applications, email, VPNs, and other systems and data most wherever they go. Sales personnel, field engineers, consultants, contractors, health care providers, students, instructors, and numerous other users will find the integrated network capacity compelling. As applications, platforms, information, and data increasingly move to the cloud (a trend that fueled netbook popularity), the iPad becomes that much more capable as a business device. 3: Ease of use The reason Apple’s won such converts — and numerous industrial design awards — is that its engineers study the way things can work, not the way they work now. As a result, the Mac, iPod, and iPhone have changed the way people perform important or common tasks. The iPad’s patented Multi-Touch display permits precise and accurate gesture input. Spreading pinched fingers explodes a folder. Flicking a finger turns pages with the same speed the finger is moved. Tapping zooms in on an object. Everything is intuitive, making device interaction easy to learn. And at just a half-inch thick and a pound-and-a-half in weight, the iPad is among the thinnest and lightest of any netbook and certainly any laptop ever made. Add in the fact that the device can go 10 hours between recharging, and you have a user-friendly tablet computer. 4: Integrated keyboard Imagine ripping the lid off a 9.7-inch wide netbook, installing the functionality of an iPhone on steroids, and then eliminating the clumsy mechanical typewriter-like keys in favor of a display-superimposed keyboard. That’s an iPad. Mobile users need not pack an additional external keyboard whenever heading to the airport, coffee shop, nearby cubicle, or other location to review email, documents, the Internet, and or other information. The iPad’s touch-screen display enables typing on a keyboard exponentially larger than that found on cell phones and sized closer to full-size laptops. For users insisting on a full-size keyboard, Apple’s included integrated Bluetooth, so external keyboards can be connected sans wires. 5: Applications, applications, applications The true value of any computing platform is largely dependent upon the number of third-party applications written for it. Programs written for the iPhone will run on the iPad, and upon the release of the iPad SDK, iPad-specific applications will absolutely flood the market. If the iPhone is any barometer, just keeping track of available tools, utilities, and programs will prove mind-boggling. Already some 140,000 applications have been produced for the iPhone and downloaded some three billion times. Expect the same fervent energy to surround the creation and consumption of iPad applications. 6: iWork Apple’s popular iWork suite will work well with the iPad. The tool set — which includes Keynote for generating presentations, Pages for creating documents, and Numbers for building spreadsheets — will be available to iPad users. The cost? Just $10 per application. The suite’s iPad compatibility ensures that business users have access to powerful applications necessary for functioning within today’s demanding office environments. iWork on the iPad will also provide a bridge for working with Microsoft Office users, as iWork enables opening, editing, and saving files using popular Office file formats. 7: iBooks Amazon’s Kindle reignited hope among publishers that eBook adoption would finally take off. In fact, the Kindle sold so well, Barnes & Noble introduced its own competitor, the Nook, in December 2009. iPad sales will crush both the Kindle and Nook, combined. Hands down. That’s because, in addition to numerous applications, full Internet capability, email, and numerous other features, the iPad includes Apple’s iBooks app. Business users frequently travel, and the ability to tote numerous books without the weight will prove another popular feature. Think of the iPad as a full-color Kindle (that’s easy to read in low light), only with the addition of full netbook computer functionality. 8: Calendaring Apple engineers have tweaked the Calendar included with the iPad. Much like the iPhone’s Calendar, the tablet PC can display events listed by day, week, and month. On the iPad, multiple calendars can be viewed simultaneously, thereby enabling juggling multiple schedules so common among office workers today. With the benefit of integrated wireless Internet (and optional cellular broadband data networking), consistent connectivity to an Exchange server means users can keep schedules synchronized without requiring third-party sync tools or other clunky measures. 9: Contacts Few things are more important to sales personnel, field teams, and professional services staff than their address books. The iPad’s Contacts app provides a simple but powerful method of managing contacts and contact lists. With integrated data networking, synchronization becomes a breeze. Even better, when seeking a client or customer’s location, a quick tap of the street address opens Maps automatically. As realtors, traveling sales staff, and other mobile professionals can attest, these little time-saving tweaks are what helped fuel millions of iPhone sales. 10: The price A good netbook is five hundred bucks. Apple’s iPad starts at just $499. With the right mix of applications, storage capacity, and network technology corresponding to each user’s specific needs, many business professionals will find a well-equipped iPad capable of replacing a much more expensive laptop in the field. For once, whether it’s Apple’s recognition that it’s debuting the iPad toward the tail of the Great Recession or a concession to detractors incessantly complaining about the high cost of Apple hardware (overlooking the more beneficial long-term total cost of ownership), Apple has priced a new device similarly to Windows-based counterparts.

iPad: The Bad

10 reasons why I'll be passing on the iPad By Debra Littlejohn Shinder, MVP On January 27, Apple held a much-hyped and long-anticipated "event" in San Francisco, where Steve Jobs unveiled the company's new tablet device, named (perhaps, in the wake of all the jokes it inspired, to its regret) the iPad. I was looking forward to finding out exactly what the specs on this were going to be. I've been trying to find a really good tablet PC for years, since way back when Microsoft introduced Windows XP Tablet Edition. I love the concept, but none of the devices that have hit the market since then has quite gotten it right -- at least for me. Would Apple be the one to finally do it? Given my experiences with the Mac in the past, I wasn't overly optimistic, but I was willing to give it a chance. Now, after all the speculation and rumors, its tablet is out in the open for everyone to see. And no, I won't be lining up outside the Apple Store to buy one. Like so many of Apple's products, it's pretty, but that's just not enough. This device may fit your needs completely, but here are the top 10 reasons that it falls short for me. There's no physical keyboard There are two basic tablet form factors. The first is the "convertible," which includes a keyboard and a swiveling screen that allows you to use it like a regular laptop or lay the screen down on top of the keyboard and use it flat. The second is the "slate," which is a flat screen with no physical keyboard. We all knew the Apple device would fall into the latter category. Up until the unveiling ceremony, the rumor mill was calling it the iSlate. Thus the lack of a physical keyboard doesn't come as a surprise, but it is a strike against it in my book. Some are saying the virtual keyboard is very good, but I've tried touch typing on them before and it's just not the same. If I want a compact touch screen device I can use to watch videos, surf the Web, read my email, etc., I can do all of that with my smart phone. If I need to do more than that, it's probably going to involve touch typing. And for that, I can use my laptop or netbook. If I want to watch a movie or TV program on a screen that's larger than my phone's, I can do that on the laptop, too. Why would I need to buy and carry a third device? This one size doesn't fit all If the tablet is going to fit into some gap between the phone and the netbook, the size should be somewhere in between, too. The iPad's screen is about 10 inches, the same as most netbooks. It won't fit into your pocket. It's thin and light, but so are many of the netbooks on the market now. For example, the Sony VAIO X series laptop/netbooks are the same half-inch thick and virtually the same weight (1.5 lbs. vs. 1.6 lbs.). And we're also starting to see netbooks in the convertible tablet form factor, which is really exciting. It runs a phone OS I would have been more tempted by the iPad if it ran OS X instead of the iPhone operating system. A phone OS is much more limited in what it can do, and the iPad suffers from the same limitation as the iPhone when it comes to applications: Yes, there are lots of them, but you can get them only from one source, Apple's App Store. Can you imagine the outcry if Microsoft said you could buy Windows programs only from them? One of the biggest limitations of the iPhone OS is that you can't multi-task. Like it or not, we live in a multi-tasking world today. People may be satisfied with running just one app at a time on their phones -- after all, the screen isn't big enough to see multiple windows -- but with a device that's four times as big and costs quite a bit more, we expect to get a real computer. And real computers multi-task. There's not enough storage The iPad will come with 16, 32, or 64 GB of storage. From my experiences with the early netbooks, I learned that 16 or 32 GB of storage isn't enough for me. Granted, my needs may be greater than that of the average user. But by the time I install all the programs I want to use and put my music, photos, and a few videos on there, what once upon a time seemed like a lot of space really isn't. The 64 GB model might be just barely enough, but the price is high -- much higher than a netbook with four times the storage. There's No HDMI output or camera Today, computing is all about multimedia -- both consuming it and creating it. You can watch HD movies on the iPad (although it doesn't have the 16:9 standard aspect ratio), but you can't output them to your HDTV because there's no HDMI connector. And you won't be making movies or taking pictures with your iPad, either. One handy use for a device of this size and form factor would be video conferencing… except Apple forgot to include a camera and microphone. Most new laptops and netbooks have a built-in Web cam. Even the iPhone has a camera, albeit not a particularly good one. You could just buy a Web cam and connect it… but what do you connect it to? That brings us to the next problem. There are no USB ports Even those $299 netbooks have USB ports for expandability. Not only could it be used for a flash drive, to ameliorate the storage problem; it could also be used to plug in a standard USB keyboard when you need to touch type. But Apple chose not to build any USB ports into the device. I understand that you will be able to add USB support by buying a special dongle that connects to a dock. That's all well and good, but it means that you have to spend more money for something every netbook already comes with. And even worse, you'll have to carry these extras around with you if you want that functionality when you're on the go -- which sort of negates the whole idea of "thin and light and compact." There's no flash memory slot The saving grace for my first netbook was that I could add storage with a flash memory card. The iPad, unfortunately, doesn't have a built-in flash memory card slot. Again, Apple is going the dongle route. More to carry around, and more to spend money on. By the time you buy everything you need to get it closer to the functional equivalent of a netbook, you may end up spending a bundle. And that brings us to the next point. The price is not right Those who love the iPad are seemingly in awe of its "aggressive pricing." And for those used to paying Apple's prices, I guess it does seem like a bargain. But for those who come from a PC world, not so much. I think there is a market for a low-cost touch screen tablet device that serves as an ebook reader, Web browser, and mail client, and on which you can view photos and videos. The iPad is priced several hundred dollars too high for that market. Lots of people would pay $299 for something like that. But the iPad pricing starts at $499 for the 16 GB model with no 3G connectivity. From there, it goes up to $829 if you want 64 GB of storage and 3G. For that much money, you can buy a powerful compact laptop that runs a full-fledged operating system and multi-tasks and that has USB and SD and Ethernet connectors, 4 GB of RAM, and 250 GB of storage. The iPad is being touted as a better ebook reader, but it costs twice as much as the Kindle and other ebook readers. It's locked in Apple loves to lock you in, and it hasn't broken precedent here. You have to buy your apps from the App Store, you have to buy its dongles to use standard accessories like SD cards and USB devices, and you can't even remove and replace the battery yourself. The 10-hour battery life is impressive (although some netbooks offer comparable times), but if you were flying to Australia and wanted to bring along an extra battery for the extra-long flight, forget about it. On the software side, you can't run Skype to make phone calls with it, either. We wouldn't want to cut into the iPhone market, after all. Nor can you download Flash to install on the browser, which means you won't be watching those YouTube videos. It's all about the network One reason I was actually thinking that Apple's tablet might be a possibility for me was the rumor going around, pre-release, that it was going to work on the Verizon network. You could almost hear the silent groans when it was announced that the 3G versions of the device will use AT&T's network. I know dozens of people who love the iPhone but won't buy one because they don't want to deal with AT&T. The company has already had network congestion problems that it blames on the popularity of the iPhone. Now it plans to add iPads to the mix? And you'll have to pay another $30/month for unlimited data for your iPad (or $20 for 250MB), on top of what you're already paying for your cell phone. Or do they expect people to give up their phone data plans and just use the iPad for data? I don't see all those iPhone users doing that. This thing is looking more expensive by the minute. Of course, if you buy the lower priced versions of the iPad, you won't have to worry about 3G anyway, since they don't come with that capability. Here's wishing you good luck on finding those wi-fi hot spots.

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The Last Chance

Recently, after President Obama's State Of The Union speech, I wanted to have a different dialogue with my conservative family over politics. Take Obama's advice, stop the same old arguments and vitriol. Unfortunately, the results were not surprising. I'll keep it short. It went something like this... Obama didn't inherit any problems from bu$h, and he should have solved the economic crisis facing the U.S. by now. The bu$h "Tax Cuts" for plutocrats have helped the American worker. "The Housing Bubble" was created by Democrats because they wanted everyone to own a home, regardless of the deceptive lending practices. True documented facts aren't history... unless it's the new fake facts, which make it solid conservative history. Why should they pay for the "Health Care Reform", when they have insurance. The old standards still hold true, "Greed is Good" and "Gay Rights" equals tolerance for pedophiles. Abolishing the Fairness Doctrine did not open the door for Rush Limbaugh and Fox News. Nullifying the Glass-Steagall Act was good "Free Market" Capitalism. The recent Supreme Court decision favoring corporate contributions still leaves individuals on equal footing. There was no long term conservative agenda or right wing conspiracy stemming from The Powell Memo, (yet, refused to read it). Don't call conservatives racists if they oppose Obama's policies, especially those conservatives who do not confront and protest the creation, spreading and/or laughing at Obama jokes; but it was fine to call Progressives and Liberals traitors when they opposed the Iraq war Americans were lied into by the bu$h administration. And the funniest line of all, conservatives don't watch FOX NEWS. I honestly tried to start the conversation in a positive manner. I mentioned that we must have some common ground and proceed from there, I even complimented them by saying, "At least conservatives have stuck to a long term agenda for what they think is right for the country." After family values and honesty, we started to move in different directions and the discussion started to fade fast. I gave in on "National Security", but mentioned we spend too much money on it. I agreed on "self-sufficiency" after everyone from all social classes has equal opportunity. One major sticking point on "freedom from too much government", came when I said, "Then you must let the individual decide what is right for themselves, such as a Woman's right to choose." The conversation quickly moved to "Right to Life", and I mentioned it's fine for conservatives to want the baby to be born but don't support government programs for the child when he's growing up. I couldn't get any of them to concede on gun restrictions for inner cities. Since the conversation got tied up with Corporate America's rights, we didn't even get to the environment and climate change. I will say it started genteel enough, but after awhile it was back to the same old caustic arguments. I now know it is useless to talk to these automatons, even if they are family. They are the most shallow, thick, misinformed, obtuse group of riffraff I have ever known. This was the last chance. I will stop wasting energy and effort reaching out for a middle ground... their thought process is closed off for new ideas, deeply entrenched and rooted in ignorance. I'm proud that I gave an effort but learned Progressives must outlast and persevere. Progressives cannot ever trust conservatives, they are like "The Terminator", and will not ever stop! I know the truth is on our side. Sorry President Obama, nothing has changed the conservative mindset.

cross posted at Low and Left Part Deux