Common Sense Filter

Just in case you think all of your main stream news is biased, here comes an article found on Slashdot. This could be a fault in the way the article is written but on the surface your common sense filter should go off.

Here is what you read when you are on the site…

“We know that the iPad is selling like hotcakes, but how satisfied are the people who buy it? Over at Technologizer, we conducted a survey of 6,000 iPad early adopters. There are a few places where they were critical — the majority, for instance, aren’t happy with Apple’s App Store approval process. Overall, however, they’re overwhelmingly upbeat.”

Now, the first red light to go off would be the one that says “Why would an iPad user give a rat’s ass about the iTunes Store Application Approval Process?”

(picture source: PC World)

The quick answer. They wouldn’t. The person buying an iPad is buying to use it. If they want an application, they simply go to iTunes and pick what they want and buy it. At present, Apple does NOT have a section in the iTunes store devoted to applications that they may be sitting on waiting to release or deny at some future date.

In order for the consumer to “care” about the approval process they would have to know something about it and why would they? How would they know who is developing what and in addition, what problems they may be having getting their product up on the iTunes store? “EA is coming out with this really cool game but Apple is holding up releasing it. I really don’t like the application approval process.” So, a majority of those random folks you surveyed sounded something like that?

I submit that they wouldn’t.

A majority of a survey of 6,000 users would not turn up such findings unless those 6,000 were strictly developers. Without taking a survey, I can tell you that my daughter doesn’t like the fact that it doesn’t have a USB port.

Me: So, Jennifer what don’t you like about the iPad.
Jennifer: I wish it had a USB port.
Me: So, what do you think about the application approval process?
Jennifer: Huh? Is that an app? How much is that?
Me: Nevermind.

The bomb discovered in Times Square yesterday is most certainly startling but I’m afraid that we’re probably not looking at something that was attempted and failed but rather a very successful test run of bigger things yet to come.

Hypothesis: Is it possible to plant a car bomb in the very heart of Times Square successfully?

Answer: Yes. It is.

This just goes to show how vulnerable we still really are. At the very least, the folks who wish us harm now know that they can get a car full of explosives into New York City without much trouble.

I have no doubt that the United States will be hit again by terrorists. It would be unrealistic to assume otherwise. Muslims see the US as the biggest obstacle to their master plan so of course, we are a target. The evil west and all of that.

I would hope that when they hit us again we have a strong leader sitting in the White House. Someone that we could all rally behind in a time of great need.

The day is coming. We cannot afford to meet the day with someone in charge who has really never been in charge of anything. His professional credentials made up by a pool of Democrats who just didn’t have anyone else who could win on their own merits. Obama is our first “manufactured” president.

He was manufactured to do many things. Leading the nation, unfortunately, is not one of them.

When the next BIG DAY comes, I hope we have someone in charge who won’t simply pee his pants and ask for a PB and J when the going gets tough.

In a recent development in the land of beer and sausage comes a striking blow to those who would like to store your personal communications information for a period of six months. You know. Just in case law enforcement might need it for something.

via Slashdot…

Germany’s highest court on Tuesday overturned a law allowing authorities to retain data on telephone calls and e-mail traffic to help fight terrorism and crime. The Federal Constitution Court ruled that major changes needed to be made to a 2008 law ordering data on calls made from mobile or fixed-line telephones and e-mail traffic to be kept for six months for possible access by law enforcement agencies.

The judges said the data storage was not secure enough and that it was not sufficiently clear what it would be used for. A record number of almost 35,000 people, including current Justice Minister Sabine Leutheusser-Schnarrenberger, had originally brought the case to the court. The law stems from a European Union directive.

The court said all data stored to date must be deleted immediately. It said the law went far beyond the requirements of the EU directive. The storage of data could “cause a diffusely threatening feeling of being under observation that can diminish an unprejudiced perception of one’s basic rights in many areas,” said the president of the court, Hans-Jürgen Papier.

Absolutely shocked? I was.

This is the European Union after all. Peace, love, socialism, and all of that.

If you take the time to read the article you’ll see that the fight isn’t over yet. The Germans would be ok with a law that had better defined parameters when it comes to the storage, use, and access of the data.

I suppose if you whack people with a stick long enough they might just get pissed off.

Sounds ridiculous doesn’t it?

Regulation implies something which man controls.

Nature is something man does not control.

Somehow, we are supposed to believe that those two words go together.

They obviously do not.

CO2 or carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring gas. It is the by-product of the mammalian respiratory cycle. We breathe in oxygen and exhale carbon dioxide.

That is a fact.

Plants use carbon dioxide for growth and expend oxygen in the process. We call this a “circle of life” if you will. A mutually beneficial relationship and one that has lasted for thousands of years.

Somehow. Somewhere in our recent history our elected officials think that they know better than nature and think that they somehow have the power to control one of these two elements.

The damaging component is the reason they believe the regulation is needed. Excessive carbon dioxide is leading to global warming. Have you looked outside lately? Warming? Seriously? This theory that carbon dioxide is a major player in the global warming hoax has been refuted and shown to be completely false.

With that being said, where are the calls in the senate for the brakes to be applied.

Trying to regulate nature based on a theory that has been proven wrong has to be the very definition of insanity.

If you are wondering why you should be looking forward to voting congress out of office, I believe this is just one small reason.

I have many many more.

To the folks who are Sarah Palin robots, this post is not for you.

I like Sarah Palin but I seriously do not agree with everything the woman says.

Case in point. Exhibit A.

Now the smart thing will be for independents who are such a part of this Tea Party movement to, I guess, kind of start picking a party,” Palin said. “Which party reflects how that smaller, smarter government steps to be taken? Which party will best fit you? And then because the Tea Party movement is not a party, and we have a two-party system, they’re going to have to pick a party and run one or the other: ‘R’ or ‘D’.

Telling the Tea Party movement that they need to pick a party solely because we only have a two party system is ludicrous. It completely discounts the many reasons that the tea party movement exists. The tea party movement (the real one) is party neutral. So, I suppose that it’s ok to pick the lesser of two evils? Isn’t that what the McCain campaign was all about for the true grass roots conservative types who, on several occasions, denied McCain a presidential bid?

Yes.

Thinking that you absolutely must pick sides is part of the problem here.

The Democrat candidate sucks. The Republican candidate sucks.

If a tea party candidate who believes in everything I do runs, why shouldn’t I vote for them? What’s more important? Is it more important that the candidate have an R after their name or is it more important to vote for someone who actually represents me and my views?

Telling someone that they absolutely positively MUST pick sides is the problem.

I’m also afraid that the person who said that has absolutely no idea what she’s talking about.

Global Warming is the one issue that I can honestly say that I saw right through from day one. It NEVER made any sense. I don’t need to be a scientist to see the bullshit. I feel vindicated.

In my on going “common sense is dead” series…

This level of dumb is amazing.

PORT OF SPAIN (Reuters) – Commonwealth leaders will lobby for an international climate deal that includes $10 billion for next year to help poor and vulnerable states fight the effects of global warming, the Maldives president said on Saturday.

Mohamed Nasheed, whose small Indian Ocean state risks being swamped by rising sea levels caused by climate change, said the proposal for such funding was part of a draft climate statement to be issued on Saturday by Commonwealth leaders meeting in Trinidad and Tobago.

The entire article is here.

In case you’ve missed it, man made global warming has been publicly shown to be a fraud. You can get started on all of the reading here.

I am forever reminded of this line from Star Wars.

“So this is how liberty dies? With thunderous applause…”

The feel good deed: By extending benefits, the government will help you get back on your feet and keep you and your family from starvation.

The unintended consequences: Keeping you out of a job will make you more dependent on the government and absolutely do irreparable damage to the economy by preventing people from getting up off of their asses and actually working and doing stuff. No start up companies. Only consumers doing what they do best. Consuming. Seems to me that if you are starving, you’d be more inclined to get out there and hunt for food. Why hunt when the government is paying you to sit on your ass?

WASHINGTON — The Senate voted unanimously Wednesday to offer up to 20 more weeks of unemployment benefits to those who have been out of work a long time, after weeks of delay in which hundreds of thousands of Americans exhausted their government aid.

The measure will increase to 99 weeks, or nearly two years, the maximum length of time that a jobless worker can get benefits in some states.

99 weeks? Who would have thought that being laid off could be considered a “career choice?”

Thanks uncle Sam. Read the whole story here.

While perusing around this morning, I happened on this headline from Reuters. “White House says stimulus saving education jobs”

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Obama administration said on Monday its economic stimulus had saved or created 250,000 education jobs, as it sought to push back against Republicans who contend the package was wasteful and had not worked.

The Republicans are saying that it isn’t working because it isn’t working. I guess cause the Republicans are focusing on the private sector where it really matters and not the government where it doesn’t. The quarter of a million jobs we are now losing on a monthly basis are private sector jobs not public ones.

It’s like getting shot in the arm and bandaging your leg. Like that.

I had to read the headline once again to make sure I wasn’t dreaming or perhaps read this incorrectly.

School teachers outside of the public system were excluded in this story. The stimulus didn’t save the private sector jobs just the public ones that you already pay for anyway. I mean “saved or created.”

School teachers are on the public payroll. You pay them. You the taxpayer. In theory, school districts are funded for the most part by local school taxes which then pay for school teachers. Federal money is given in the form of a supplement to existing programs and so on.

Let’s assume that the federal money is paying for the teacher’s salaries (it’s really not but play along). What this headline says is that the federal government isn’t cutting jobs that it wasn’t going to cut anyway and that the stimulus has everything to do with that.

Complete and utter nonsense.

This is absolutely fabulous and amazingly enough, true.