American Warmonger

Blogging For Dollars

Harvey over at Bad Example is currently unemployed and convinced that he will wind up with a job that has the word "analyst" in the title. I'd be willing to bet he'd end up in a cube farm. If anybody isn't sure about what sort of hell this guy has in store then you need to watch Office Space one more time.

Long story short he has five (5) months to try and earn a living through blogging. I know all of us have thought about doing this ourselves and we all have different ways we could go about doing it. What I'm asking is that anybody that doesn't know Harvey to start visiting his site regularly, click on any advertising that may come up, buy adspace if it becomes available and offer money making ideas related to the blogsphere.

Help Harvey live the new American dream. Otherwise he'll be stuck in cube farm hell forever. Go offer your support now.

SAVE FERRIS HARVEY!

World of Warcraft - ON SALE!!

Just because I have nothing better to do I decided to peruse the Best Buy weekly ad. Yes, I know. I should have noticed this on Sunday. The game I've been oggling for about six months now has done something I never would have expected until Christmas: It went ON SALE!!

Two locations have it on sale this week:

Best Buy for 39.99
CompUSA for 40.99 (online only)

I have issues with ComUSA and how they do business so it's off to Best Buy for me! (I have a gift card for them anyway.)

If I disapear for a month or two you know what happened...

Summer Fun With Scott and Michael

Now that both trials are over and it's a lazy Summer day I ponder the question about our gossip culumn media. Which trail provided the most entertainment value? Was it Michael Jackson? Scott Peterson? Maybe it's the long belated vindication of the mississippi Burning trial that kept you glued to the television while more relovent news stories were crawling across the bottom of your screen.

Whatever trial it was this is the thread to hash it out. Go for it guys.

Editor's Note: (Like I have an editor, HA!) This is just for the trials. The thread for the missing persons will be coming next week...or the next time I'm having a slow blog day.

Review: Life Of Agony - Broken Valley

So I get this new Life Of Agony DC, Broken Valley. I'm expecting some resemblance to the dark, low and moody sounds more than ten years ago. After this long of a gap I expected them to have tempered that dark, brooding feel with at least some semblance of a tempo. After all, their sophomore effort, Ugly, was a far cry from rhythmic. Ten years can to a lot with a band. Life Of Agony is no exception. This may be the original cast of characters but they are a completely different band now. Gone are the days of dark brooding melodies. This is not the same band, not even close. If you want to hear that sort of music go buy their first album, River Runs Red.

Something of note here is that even though they aren't the same band they don't suck either. In fact, they have a pretty tight sound. No, that's not right. They have an extremely tight sound. From the way they arranged each piece it appeared they had locked themselves up for those ten long years and practiced at reinventing themselves.

This post is also available at Blogger News Network.

The downside of that is that place they locked themselves up in had a full collection of Stone Temple Pilots CDs. On the first listen through of the album I counted about ten times I wanted to take the CD out of the player and verify I wasn't listening to an STP album; a damn good STP album at that.

Maybe it was just me but most of the songs sounded as if they were made to honor a different band. My wife picked up the first one, "It sounds like that alien song". Actually, it was Aerials by System Of A Down that she meant to say. I had to agree with her. Let me compile a list:

1. Love to let you down: Aerials - System of a down
2. Last Cigarette: STP
3. Wicket Ways: Veruca Salt - One Last Time
4. Don't bother: One time a thing occurred to me...wait...wrong STP song.
5. Strung Out: Completely Original
6. Junk Sick: Sugar teat?...more STP
7. The Calm That Disturbs You: Starts off like Robert Trujillo from Metallica then trails off.
8. No One Survives: Pink Floyd - The Wall or Dark Side Of The Moon
9. Justified: Starts off like Zombie from the Cranberries then trails off.
10. The Day He Died: Yet More STP
11. Broken Valley: Something off The Crow soundtrack - It Can't Rain All The Time
12. Room 244: The other LOA

Now that I've dissected the album to the best of my abilities I really hope I didn't spoil it for anybody. In fact, I hope this challenges you to go out and see for yourselves because it's a pretty good album overall. After the third time through the album I found myself starting to sing along to songs 1-6, 10 while I'm trying to critique everything.

What about songs 7-9, 11, 12? Well, the backup vocals ruined 7. Sorry guys, let Keith Caputo sing and the rest of you should stick to your instruments. 8, 12 were fillers. I wish they had turned into songs. Finally, 9 and 11 were just too soft to suit the rest of the album.

The band aside there was one element that stuck out in my mind. The mixing was almost perfect. I say almost because whoever was mixing things seems to have made a slight mistake with vocals clarity. I'm not sure if they needed to push the vocals just a hair louder or if there's some magic clarity knob on the soundboard that got bumped, but it was just slightly muffled. Not too much, though. Mind you, I was singing along to half the album by the end of my reviews so it wasn't that bad.

Okay, I've covered the band, the songs and the mixing. The last major point that usually gets ignored: Album Art. Three things stand out here:

1. This album looks like it was stepped on. That is a completely new concept for me. I would never have thought of doing that. Excellent idea!

2. Whoever did the lettering needed to do something with the Broken Valley words. If you don't look for them the dark, thin, red lines blend into the black background.

3. The behind the CD art is always my favorite. It's like a hidden surprise. What is it you may ask? I'm not telling. That would ruin the surprise. I will say that is was the right piece to put there. Nice choice to whoever thought of it.

Well, that about wraps this review up. If I had to give it a number I'd give it an 8 out of 10. If this had been just on the first half of the CD I'd have given it a 9.5.

As one last note this may be because I haven't really put any CDs in my computer in a while, but if you do be sure to have DirectX 9 installed. There’s some extra stuff in digital.

Testing Pings

Phin, over at Phin's Blog gave me a heads up on the blogrolling pinger. What's a pinger? It's basically a little tool you can use to tell a site that you have updated your blog. If you don't send pings some people will have no idea when you update. Remember, updating is one of the keys to more traffic.

Here's the list he's got running:

http://api.my.yahoo.com/RPC2
http://api.my.yahoo.com/rss/ping
http://bblog.com/ping.php
http://bitacoras.net/ping/
http://blog.goo.ne.jp/XMLRPC
http://blogbot.dk/io/xml-rpc.php
http://blogdb.jp/xmlrpc
http://bulkfeeds.net/rpc
http://coreblog.org/ping/
http://ping.cocolog-nifty.com/xmlrpc
http://ping.rootblog.com/rpc.php
http://ping.syndic8.com/xmlrpc.php
http://ping.weblogs.se/
http://rcs.datashed.net/RPC2
http://rpc.blogrolling.com/pinger/
http://rpc.pingomatic.com/
http://rpc.technorati.com/rpc/ping
http://rpc.weblogs.com/RPC2
http://topicexchange.com/RPC2
http://www.a2b.cc/setloc/bp.a2b
http://www.bitacoles.net/ping.php
http://www.blogpeople.net/servlet/weblogUpdates
http://www.weblogues.com/RPC/
http://xmlrpc.blogg.de/
http://www.blogroots.com/tb_populi.blog?id=1
http://xping.pubsub.com/ping/

Here's one more that I've been using. I think you have to register your site with these guys but it's been so long now I can't remember.

http://ping.weblogalot.com/rpc.php

Phin has more info over at his site. Good article Phin!

Patriotic Pictures 2

President Bush Visits Travis Air Force Base. Yeah, not all these patriotic pictures are going to be boobies. It's just..well...patriotic pictures.

Nick Queen is a believer.

Yes, we all know he's a Christian. I'm not talking about his faith in God. Today it's about his faith in Durbin. Durbin is supposed to be a well respected guy, right? Go see what Nick believes thanks to Dick.

This one's worthy of the Goomba awards.

Happenings in Mongerville

1. Just dropped in the code for Blogs for McCain's Opponent. I'm sorry, the guy has been doing just a bit too much butt snorkeling with the DNC as of late. Hell, how many commercials does he have out with Kennedy?

2. My article, Dick Durbin - Bad For America was Lisa Iannucci's pick of the week over at Blogcritics. For this coveted award I'd like to thank Dick Durbin for pissing me off enough to lambaste him like that.

3. I believe it's high time I tweaked my template...or my nipples. Not sure which yet. Anyway, I'm planning on taking everything on the left and moving it to the right. I undertand that my layout does not conform to 800x600 screen size so the blind people need to move the page around. This switch would enable easier reading from that perspective.

Security Clearance Hell

Anybody wonder why I only put up a quickie today? No? I'm always sporadic? Gee, thanks for the sympathy.

Has anybody here ever had to get a government clearance and fill out their wonderful paperwork? I don't care who you are, you ain't seen nuthyin' yet.

Tonight's completed security paperwork completed:

- Self EPSQ (SF 86 Digital Form)(10 pages)
- Foreign Born Spouse Statement of Personal History (FBS-SPH)
- Subject Acknowledgement Statement (A one page essay on your spousal relationship)
- Spouse EPSQ (SF 86 Digital Form)(10 pages)

ouch...I think I lost my brain...

Sometimes headlines just write themselves

Just flipping through the news today I caught a glimpse of a headline that just HAD to be a typo. This is too perfect. I'm sorry the guy died and all, but I can't help but laugh:

Cardinal Sin, leader of 'People Power' movement, dies at 76

Can someone else write a comment for this? That name is so much low hanging fruit I can't decide which route I should take with it.

I guess this is a comment contest on a name. Go for it guys!

...I'm probably going to hell for this.

Gingrich Calls for Censuring Durbin

Everyone has heard what Durbin said. I have no need to repeat them here. By now you have read something that has polarized you on a topic once again. Either this whole deal has been "blown out of proportion" and Bush really is a Nazi, or you believe that Dick Durbin's comments were completely unjustified and out of line. To help you understand what his statements really meant let me clarify a few things:

1. Claiming someone's actions are like or similar to a person or persons of vile and infamous note is a direct insult. We are defined by our actions. If you state one's actions are deplorable you have attacked the person.

2. No amount of saying how much you really love and support the troops changes the reality of the knife in their back. I would rather you just kill me and get it over with than shake my hand with your right while you plunge the knife with your left. Call it a misunderstood statement. Claim we're ignoring the substance, but what has been said can have no sugar coating.

3. Making accusations of anything in a congressional forum is the same as filing a lawsuit. You have made an official declaration and better have the facts to back up your story, not just a report in which you can't even tell if it was a statement from an FBI agent or if it was just a report from an FBI agent. Doesn’t an FBI agent write all the reports from the prisoners? When an official speaks in a congressional forum he speaks to the world that something is fact and has tangible evidence to back up your claim.

This post is also available at Blogger News Network.

This being said you should be able to ascertain this writer's opinion on this particular issue. I feel that Dick Durbin made a statement in an official capacity that stated torture similar to that which happened by the most heinous of persons has gone on at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Not just that, but you make the official claim that it was not only authorized, but directed by the senior most official of the United States.

Isn't someone going to do something? Isn't someone going to stand up and let people know they need to stop name calling? When is it going to stop? How far can a congressman go before someone throws the foul flag? When is enough enough?

Today a small group of senators have taken a stand to claim their absolution from Durbin's statements. They are asking for congress to make a declaration that Durbin's statements do not speak for the whole of congress but his voice alone. So, without further blathering, let the quotes begin:

"He should certainly apologize," Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press." "There's no comparison whatsoever."

Yes, McCain asked for an apology from Durbin. I'm not defending him, but the quote is there....of course, this quote is there too:

I think on balance the argument has got to be, the weight of evidence has got to be that we've got to adjudicate these people's cases, and that means that if it means releasing some of them, you'll have to release them. Look, even Adolf Eichmann got a trial. We are signatories to numerous agreements on human rights against torture, universal declaration on human rights, et cetera. So that means that we have to do something with these people, and I hope we can move that process forward very soon.

I have two things to say:
1. When is McCain going to officially switch parties?
2. I would like to officially join Blogs for McCain's Opponent now.

Lets see what Newt Gingrich had to say:

And in an appearance on "Fox News Sunday," Gingrich argued that Durbin's words had damaged the U.S. abroad. On the English-language website of the Arabic news channel Al Jazeera, an article about Durbin's remarks was listed Sunday as one of the site's most-frequently e-mailed items.

"You cannot … have a public official quoted throughout the world by our enemies describing the U.S. in these terms," Gingrich said. "It puts every young American in uniform at risk."

So Al-Jazeera's most e-mailed comment on Sunday was Durbin's quote. Sort of tells me that he caused a stir in the terrorist ranks. Anyway, that's a fight for a different post. Let's get back to censure:

Here's the link to the document Newt was passing around the senate on Friday: LINK

By his statements equating American treatment of suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay with the behavior of the evil regimes of Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union, and Pol Pot’s Cambodia, Senator Richard Durbin has dishonored the United States and the entire U.S. Senate. Only by a vote to censure Senator Durbin for his conduct can the U.S. Senate restore its dignity and defend American honor.

Senator Durbin’s comparison, sadly, is despicable.

Now, many people have misunderstood the meaning of censure. It is not the removal of someone from power. They are not trying to boot him from Congress. It does not even mean that the person loses any seniority. It means that the Senate, as a whole, is disavowing themselves from the disparaging statement that was made. If Durbin felt compelled to, he could sign the censure himself. In fact, if it went to censure and he signed it would be the ultimate official apology money could buy. Yes, that would be cool but lets face facts. It's not going to happen.

As Gingrich has said, this vote would also establish a character reference of where people stand in Congress. It should not be a partisan issue. It should be a bi-partisan issue. Whether you believe Durbin's words were misunderstood or not, the true censuring is against the belief that our men and women in the United States are no better Nazi in a death camp.

Patriotic Pictures

I guess I'm starting my own version of "Sorta Blogless Sunday"