[Quote:]

…nuh-uh. No sireebob.

Fuck.

[Quote:]

The U.S. military met its major recruiting goals in 2007, the Pentagon said on Wednesday, but faces high hurdles for 2008 as the Army tries to grow faster without further lowering standards for new soldiers.

All four active-duty units of the U.S. military met recruiting goals, but the National Guard missed its targets.

The Army, the largest branch of the U.S. military, had to use bonuses and other incentives to lure recruits but beat by 407 its goal of 80,000 new soldiers in fiscal year 2007, which ended Sept. 30.

Still, with the Iraq war in its 5th year, recruiting is getting tougher, recruiters have said. More recruits enter military service without a high school diploma and 18 percent of Army recruits last year needed waivers for past criminal behavior, Pentagon officials said at a briefing.

Parents and other adults with influence over youth, known by recruiters as “influencers,” have become less supportive of military service, said David Chu, the defense undersecretary for personnel and readiness. He would not link it to the war but said further erosion of support would hurt recruiting.

So those pesky influencers have become less supportive of military service in general and the current usage of the military services has nothing to do with that.

Got it.

[Quote:]

A Maryville woman who went to court on Aug. 14 for a child custody hearing says she was persecuted because of her religious beliefs at the hands of the Blount County judicial system.

According to Jo Anne White, what was supposed to be a standard child custody hearing turned into an almost hourlong “Bible study” in the courtroom in spite of the repeated protests of her attorney, Kevin W. Shepherd.

After a detailed discussion of her religious beliefs — documented in court reporter transcripts obtained by The Daily Times — and a brief recess to chambers, Blount County Circuit Court Judge W. Dale Young awarded temporary custody of White’s two children to her ex-husband. The custody will be reviewed again in Circuit Court on Dec. 11.

While Young questioned White about one specific aspect of her religion, attorney Craig Garrett, who represented White’s ex-husband, asked numerous probing questions about her faith. Of the 65 pages of court transcripts reviewed by The Daily Times, 41 pages deal directly with White’s religious beliefs.

“We were discussing specific Scriptures and the details of end-times prophesy,” White said. “My attorney kept protesting, but the judge kept it going for almost an hour.

“At one point, I told the judge, ‘I didn’t write the Bible — so why are we discussing this?’

“He just wouldn’t stop, and I thought I would go to jail if I didn’t respond to his questions — so I went along with it even though I knew they were inappropriate questions.

[Quote:]

One of the things that is so surprising (for me, at least) about the whole Graeme Frost episode is that rather than make their case against this program with their vicious assault against this family, they Malkin/Freeper/Limbaugh brigade are doing just the opposite. Rather than expose this family as a bunch of frauds and lazy slackers and welfare queens, they are making the family’s case.

If you look through this family’s dossier, it appears they are doing everything Republicans say they should be doing- hell, their story is almost what you would consider a checklist for good, red-blooded American Republican voters: they own their own business, they pay their taxes, they are still in a committed relationship and are raising their kids, they eschewed public education and are doing what they have to do to get them into Private schools, they are part of the American dream of home ownership that Republicans have been pointing to in the past two administrations as proof of the health of the economy, and so on.

In short, they are a white, lower-middle-class, committed family, who is doing EVERYTHING the GOP Kultur Kops would have you believe people should be doing. They aren’t gay. They aren’t divorced. They didn’t abort their children. They aren’t drug addicts or welfare queens. They are property owners, entrepeneurs, taxpayers, and hard-working Americans. I bet nine times out of ten in past elections, if you handed this resume to a pollster, they would think you were discussing the prototypical Republican voter. Hell, the only thing missing from this equation is membership to a church and an irrational fear of Muslims and you HAVE the prototypical Bush voter.

[..]

I simply can not believe this is what the Republican party has become. I just can’t. It just makes me sick to think all those years of supporting this party, and this is what it has become. Even if you don’t like the S-Chip expansion, it is hard to deny what Republicans are- a bunch of bitter, nasty, petty, snarling, sneering, vicious thugs, peering through people’s windows so they can make fun of their misfortune.

I’m registering Independent tomorrow.

[Quote:]

Ellen Hill began to cry Wednesday night as she remembered how her conservative father – who once shunned her when she came out as a lesbian – later accepted her partner into their family at their 2000 civil union.

“I could see happy tears in his eyes,” said Hill, a resident of Jeffersonville. “He said that it is not who we love or how we love, but that we love.”

Hill was just one of dozens of gay and lesbian Vermonters who testified in support of same-sex marriage before the Vermont Commission on Family Recognition and Protection during the panel’s first public hearing Wednesday night.

More than 75 people were in the auditorium at Johnson State College and a vast majority of them were in support of extending marriage rights to gay and lesbian couples. Only two people spoke out against gay marriage.

[..]

Pearl, who was the first to speak, said he worried that legalizing gay marriage would result in minors marrying older members of the same sex.

For some time, it was perfectly legal in Utah for a 14-year old girl to marry a 35-year old man. I never heard anyone who opposed same-sex marriage claim that they needed to defend marriage against that.

He added that same-sex marriages should not be recognized because the couples cannot procreate as heterosexual couples do.

That’s why we have laws protecting same-sex marriage from the evils of 60-year-olds, the infertile and those who use birth control.

Claire LaBounty of St. Albans said she “wants to do all she can for gays and lesbians,” but as a Christian believes that marriage is a union devoted only to a husband and wife.

So your interpretation of your religion should be the law of the land?

This isn’t about marriage. It’s about religion and whether or not we’re free to ignore the religious beliefs of those with whom we disagree.

[Quote:]

Dear Mark,

I just got a call from Vice President Al Gore. He told me that he needs to travel abroad tomorrow for an exciting and urgent mission that could result in a major breakthrough in the fight against global warming.

Unfortunately, this means that we must postpone our Thursday, October 11th event with him until Friday, November 9th. But he wanted me to tell you that he can’t wait to talk to us about his trip when he comes back to San Francisco in three weeks.

While I am really disappointed that we won’t see Al Gore until next month, I am thrilled that he is continuing to provide critical leadership to address one of the most pressing issues of our time. You should know that only the most urgent global warming mission has called him out of the country.

I apologize for any last-minute inconvenience that rescheduling our event may cause you, but I look forward to seeing you on November 9th so we can all hear first-hand about Al Gore’s latest exciting initiatives.

Thank you so much for your continued friendship and support. See you in San Francisco next month!

Barbara Boxer
U.S. Senator

hmmmmmmmm

[Quote:]

For a few minutes during Microsoft Corp. CEO Steve Ballmer’s appearance at the Gartner Inc. Symposium ITxpo conference here, emotionless management-speak gave way to a mother’s frustration with the Vista operating system.

“I’m one of those early adopters of Vista,” said Yvonne Genovese, an analyst who was interviewing Ballmer along with fellow analyst David Smith on stage at a conference forum. “My daughter comes in one day and says, ‘Hey Mom, my friend has Vista, and it has these neat little things called gadgets — I need those.’”

Said Ballmer: “I love your daughter.”

“You’re not going to like her mom in about two minutes,” said Genovese, while the crowd laughed.

She went on to explain that she installed Vista for her daughter — and two days later went right back to using the XP operating system. “It’s safe, it works, all the hardware is fine, and everything is great,” she said of XP.

Genovese also argued that her experience with Vista is broadly shared: “What we’re seeing and what we’re hearing from users is a very similar thing. It’s difficult to implement. What should we be seeing that we’re not seeing?”

“Let’s start with the end user. Your daughter saw a lot of value,” said Ballmer.

“She’s 13,” Genovese shot back.

In the article, Ballmer calls Vista “the most secure release of Windows you can humanly make” which is an excellent argument for abandoning Windows.

[Quote:]

No wall space? No problem. Stick this magnetic clock on any metal surface:

[Quote:]

So its offical we have released the tiff exploit code. You can navigate in safari to http://jailbreak.toc2rta.com on your Itouch or Iphone 1.1.1. It will crash your Safari but then you will be able to browse the file system with full read/write access. This is only for people who understand what they are doing. You will need IPHUC and some knowledge of how to put/get files.

A full tutorial will be posted in the next day or so.

Here are extended instructions.

So now it’s waiting for an enterprising hacker to modify the new baseband software and make 1.1.1 simlock free.

update (12:10) Oh, wait, there it is already

[Quote:]

In plaats van een klassieker als ‘Even Apeldoorn bellen’, ‘Biertje?’ of ‘Bloemen houden van mensen’ is de beste slogan aller tijden ‘Wij van Wc-eend adviseren Wc-eend’. De afgelopen maand stemde 46 procent van de 12.500 kiezers op internet op de leus van de toiletreiniger. Dat gebeurde na een oproep van weblog GeenStijl.

Dat organisatie van de verkiezing, het Genootschap Voor Reclame (GVR), maakte woensdag de uitslag bekend.

Heinekens’ Biertje? eindigde in de verkiezing op de tweede plaats. Het genootschap vermoedt dat de klassieker de prestigieuze titel in de wacht zou hebben gesleept als GeenStijl zich niet met de verkiezing had bemoeid. GeenStijl spoorde in een tegencampagne mensen aan op de slagzin van de wc-reiniger te stemmen.

[..]

GeenStijl frustreerde twee maanden geleden ook een internetverkiezing van SIRE (Stichting Ideële Reclame). Die bood ter gelegenheid van zijn 40-jarig bestaan Nederlanders de mogelijkheid het onderwerp van een nieuwe SIRE-campagne te bedenken.

GeenStijl riep op massaal te vragen om een campagne over boterhamworst met gezichtjes. Boterhamworst stond lange tijd op nummer een in de verkiezing.

Reaktie van de organisatie: “Een volgende keer gaat het stemmen niet meer via internet..”

Minder reclame voor reclame op internet? Dat moet worden gevierd!

Biertje?

[Quote:]

Het burgemeestersreferendum in Utrecht is woensdag uitgelopen op een fiasco. Slechts 9,4 procent van de stemgerechtigde Utrechters maakte de gang naar de stembus. Omdat de opkomst onder de 30 procent lag, is de volksraadpleging ongeldig verklaard.

Van de Utrechtse stemmers bracht 16,4 procent een blanco of ongeldige stem uit. De volledige uitslag is donderdag bekend.

De reaktie van de politici is opvallend. Neem bijvoorbeeld een van de twee kandidaten:

Pans noemde in een eerste reactie dit referendum “een nachtmerrie voor de democratie” en zei “dat Utrechters hebben gestemd tegen het referendum.”

Het CDA sprak van een dramatische toestand. “Het is de duurste opiniepeiling ooit”, zei Eiko Smid, plaatsvervangend voorzitter van de Utrechtste fractie van het CDA.

“We waren vanaf het begin af aan tegen. Een referendum is geen goed middel. Wie het ook wordt, die begint nu al met een achterstand, dat is niet goed.”

[..]

Ook burgemeester Brouwer-Korf noemde de uitkomst van het referendum geen verrassing. “Ik heb veel brieven en e-mails gekregen met de vraag of het op deze manier moest.

Uit die reacties bleek dat veel mensen niet zijn gaan stemmen omdat ze geen vertrouwen in de kandidaten hebben, maar omdat ze tegen het referendum zijn.”

NEE, eikels, driewerf NEE. De mensen in utrecht hebben niet tegen een referendum gestemd, ze hebben laten merken dat ze verdomd goed weten dat ze bij de neus worden genomen, en weigeren daar aan mee te werken. Ze zijn dan ook eerder “tegen een referendum waarin niets te kiezen valt” dan “tegen een referendum”. Dan is het ook logisch dat mensen zeggen best wel vertrouwen in de kandidaten te hebben.

Dus, volgende keer gewoon echt iets te kiezen geven. Of, als jullie dat echt teveel tegen de borst stuit, wees daar dan gewoon eerlijk over en heb openlijk schijt aan de mensen: benoem gewoon een vriendje, net als vroeger.

update: En wat hebben we nou geleerd daar in Utrecht? 12% wil een PvdA burgemeester. De overige 88% wil een echte burgemeester. Precies, dat het volk helegaar niet zit te wachten op referenda. En dus worden referenda maar afgeschaft. Lang leve de EU!

[Quote:]

Fishermen and pleasure boats got a treat after a member of the US Navy Blue Angels aerial aerobatic team made a high-speed pass right in front of them.

The manoeuvre sent a huge water vapour cloud radiating from the F-18 fighter during an air show in the San Francisco Bay area yesterday.

[Quote:]

Washington state resident Paul Holman and California resident Lucy Rivello claim that Apple and AT&T illegally agreed to prevent owners of the cellular device from using programs or services that do not generate revenues for the two firms. The Plaintiffs are seeking “no less than $200 million” in damages on some counts, and demand “no less than $600 million” in other requests. Apple and AT&T are charged either jointly or separately with six formal counts that include alleged violations of California Business and Profession’s Code, The Cartwright Act, The Sherman Act, The Federal Trade Commission Act, The Communications Act of 1934, and The Telecommunications Act of 1996 alongside rules and policies set by the FCC.

The Plaintiffs — based on “information and belief” — claim that both Apple and AT&T agreed to go beyond their current unlawful tactics of locking customers into their services and software by moving to render inoperable the lawfully unlocked iPhones of consumers hoping to use non-Apple/AT&T SIM cards, or who installed third-party software. The formal complaint says that the update was also designed to cause damage to the iPhone when detecting any non-Apple/AT&T products, according to the report.

Citing Apple’s September 24th public warning to owners of unlocked iPhones, the complaint says none of the harmful changes were technically necessary in the recent iPhone software update, and claims that the changes were designed solely “to advance Apple’s unlawful purposes and conduct.”

[Quote:]

Okay, so it’s a web site. So there’s that.

And okay, so most of the content on this list tends to be things that are let’s say “accidentally hateful” or “hates of omission rather than hates of commision”, which is to say, they’re usually not actively trying to be difficult, but just chafing against how savvy users would expect them to behave. So there’s that, too.

But come on. I wanted to like this. This is supposed to be The Future. Radiohead releases their new album sans record label, on their website.

Except, err, in 20 minutes of poking around, I can’t find a link for it. I keep getting linked to different domains, including one selling all of their other albums, but nothing for this one. The closest is a link labelled “HODIAU DIREKTON”, which pops a new window with the album art for the album I’m trying to find, but no link to it. (I’m sure of this, I ended up reading the HTML source to be sure of it.)

So, no problem, I try Google. No radiohead.com links in the first couple of pages. Hrm. First one is rollingstone.com, which seems promising for at least pointing the right direction.

Except, err, the first half-dozen or so people commenting on the article are saying “I want to buy the album, but can’t find the link”. Hrm.

Ah, here we go, someone says that you have to just “know” to go to inrainbows.com, which now I see that the nice Mr. Google tried to tell me about, albeit without the customary link summary info, hence my seeing right past it the first time.

So, load the site, what do we have?

Album art. Colors. *click*

A promo-slash-info page. *click*

An order page, with links for DISCBOX or DOWNLOAD, both labelled “PRE-ORDER”, even though it’s no longer pre-. Oh well. *click*

“This item has been added to your basket”. *click*

Back to order page. Find VIEW BASKET link. *click*

The famous oh-so-prisoner’s-dilemma “name your price” page. With no numbers filled in, and no “Checkout” link. Fill in a number. *click*

“You have no items in your basket.” *click*

Back to order page. Dammit. Go to DOWNLOAD again. *click*

Fill in a number. “PAY NOW” link magically appears. Super. *click*

From there it’s pretty routine web order checkout stuff, but the hoops you have to go through to get to that point are absurd, implying at least one or both of:

* rock bands know nothing about making a usable web site (and thus this could end up poisoning their experiment in “name your price” as would-be buyers either give up and turn to BitTorrent, or get annoyed & pay zero)

* rock bands actually *might* know how to make a usable web site, but may just be willfully trying to confound all expectations how how a site should work (and thus still poisoning their experiment)

In any case, I’ll happily pay for a copy of a CD, but I’m feeling a lot more wary about paying for … whatever it was that the process for getting this “name your price” this way was trying to accomplish.

As far as I can see, the point is to insult the industry and the buyers.

[Quote:]

The United States tortures prisoners in violation of international law, former President Carter said Wednesday.

“I don’t think it. I know it,” Carter told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer.

“Our country for the first time in my life time has abandoned the basic principle of human rights,” Carter said. “We’ve said that the Geneva Conventions do not apply to those people in Abu Ghraib prison and Guantanamo, and we’ve said we can torture prisoners and deprive them of an accusation of a crime to which they are accused.”

Carter was perhaps the last decent man in the White House. That his tenure wasn’t all that successful, well, what can you do.

An Iraqi boy peered Tuesday inside a car that was towed to a Baghdad police station after two women inside were killed.
[Quote:]

Two women died here on Tuesday when their white Oldsmobile was riddled by automatic gunfire from guards for a private security company, just weeks after a shooting by another company strained relations between the United States and Iraq.