January 2009 Archives

I'm so tired of hearing this nonsense. The New Deal did not prolong the Great Depression. The New Deal had an amazing impact no the economy of this country. The only time growth slowed during FDR's administration was the year he backed off on the New Deal ('37-'38) when he was convinced by others that balancing the budget was more important than continuing the New Deal policies.

Look, you may not agree with everything that FDR did, you may not like all the policies of the New Deal, but you sound irrational when you make claims like this. It's clearly political partisan crap.

When did being a Republican change from being rational to being anti-Democrat?

Don't believe me?

Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke, "Only with the New Deal's rehabilitation of the financial system in 1933-35 did the economy begin its slow emergence from the Great Depression." In fact, even famed conservative economist Milton Friedman admitted that the New Deal's Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. was "the structural change most conducive to monetary stability since ... the Civil War."

Or let's just read the latest Nobel Prize winner's recent column on the New Deal.

If this article is to be believed, and there's no reason I can see to doubt their math, Printing The NYT Costs Twice As Much As Sending Every Subscriber A Free Kindle.

I think the obvious second point of this is that it's amazing how cheap e-ink is now.  I wonder how long it will be until there's a "E-book of the month" club that gives you, upon subscription, an ebook reader.

We were in the market for a new stroller for Phoebe, one with a bit more sturdiness for taking out on trail walks and the like. The obvious choice for us is the BOB Revolution. Sadly, it's almost $400. That seems like a crazy amount to spend on a second stroller. REI was having a sale, though, so we went down to look. Nice, nice stroller, but 20% of $389 is still not cheap.

But wait, it was REI's used gear sale weekend, and, lucky us, there was a Revolution there. It was returned because it was squeaky. Normally I'd say the people that returned it were a bit, well, prissy, for returning a squeaky stroller. In this case, though, they paid $400 for it, so I can't blame them.

Because it was returned with a problem, REI sold it to us for $150. I took it home, spent about ten minutes looking at it, squirted some 3 in 1 oil on a couple of joints, and now, no squeak.

BTW, I do believe that a $150 stroller is still pricey, but it is a very, very nice stroller

Now that Phoebe is 1 year old, her behavior has really changed. She's crawling so fast, and trying to walk, and, when she wants something she really lets us know it.

And sometimes, wow, is she a handful.

But today, on a day where her Mom is gone all day for a class, she is being a real princess. She's playing on her mat, reading her books, playing with her blocks. My perfect baby.

For now.

According to Can Free Content Boost Your Sales? Yes, It Can, Monty Python's DVD sales have increased by an astounding 23,000% on Amazon since they made all of their content available via YouTube.

I find the logic correct, but can those numbers be correct?  23,000%  Sounds fishy to me.

Here we are at last. The beginning of the Obama administration. At our house, we got up early and started watching. I took the day off of work. My sister-in-law, her husband, and their daughter, who is 12, is joining us. My niece is taking the morning off from school and we're all watching the inauguration on TV.

It's so exciting, to think what the next 4 years will bring. It's hard not to cheer the end of the Bush administration, but I'd rather think about the future, than focus on the past. What will the next few days bring? Closing of the Guantanamo prison? The end of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"? A stimulus package? Whatever it brings, I am full of hope, but I am also dreading the day that I know will come - when he does something that disappoints me.

The SFGate article, Obama, Warren and the new evangelicals, highlights just one more way the Obama administration is changing things in Washington, and, hopefully, our entire political system.  While Obama doesn't agree with Warren on all things (specifically, abortion), that doesn't mean Warren is evil, wrong, to be ignored, or isolated.  It means he has a different opinion, and that we should listen to his opinion.  That doesn't mean agree with his opinion.  It doesn't mean support his position, it means listen to him.  Warren isn't insane.  He's not a loon.  He's a person with a certain background, education, and belief system.  Why is it less valid than yours or mine?  It's not.  Honest people can honestly disagree while still working together.

That, I think, would be a huge change in our politics.  Stop looking at people you don't agree with as "them".  Treat them with respect and compassion.  The world will be a better place.

I like to read news on a lot of different topics. Politics, gadgets, local news, sports, etc. RSS and Atom feeds are a great way to keep up with things, but I'm always on the hunt for a newsreader that fits into my processes, rather than forcing me to change my habits to work with it.

I've found one - Brief. Brief is a Firefox extension that makes reading feeds as easy as reading usenet posts using a good news reader. If you don't know what usenet is, well, go to Wikipedia.

What Brief does is pull together all your feeds in the sidebar, give you quick access to unread items, and allows you to quickly mark them as read or actually go to the page and read it.

I know, it sounds simple, but it's really a great tool for keeping up with a variety of feeds.

Want to let the Obama administration know what you think needs to change in our government? Visit the Citizen's Briefing Book, based on salesforce.com's Ideas application.

This site allows you to join a community that creates and votes on ideas for changes we want to see. Create your own ideas, vote for ideas that are already posted that you agree with, vote against ideas you don't like.

This is one of the first signs that the Obama administration understands that we, as citizens, need new methods for letting our government know what we want. I'm proud of the Obama administration for implementing it, and I'm proud to be part of the company that enables them to do it.

It's not just that, they are using our products other ways, but some details of how they are using salesforce.com will have to wait until they unveil them.