Red-state vs. Blue-state Christmas movies?

Santa Claus is strictly a red-state hero
MSNBC Commentary by Erik Lundegaard

The best part is at the end:

Finally, for Democrats everywhere, I’d recommend those Christmas movies whose message is more cynical than simply putting aside common sense to have faith in Santa Claus. In “It’s a Wonderful Life,” George Bailey wishes he’d never been born; in “A Christmas Story,” Ralphie wishes for an official Red Ryder range-model air rifle; in “Home Alone,” Kevin wishes his family would just disappear. Each gets their wish. Each doesn’t like the results. You don’t have to leave the Christian faith to find the lesson here. It’s St. Teresa of Avila: More tears are shed over answered prayers than unanswered prayers. Hopefully, over the next four years, 51 percent of the country won’t have to realize the wisdom of her words.

I have too darn many DVDs

I just finished re-cataloging them, and if I’m counting right and have removed all the duplicate entries properly, well over 400 of them (I had an exact number there but have already noted duplicates and omissions).

A list, for the truly masochistic (or those who want to gloat that they’ve got even more) after the break. Actually, it’s mainly for family to make sure that any Christmas gifts don’t duplicate ones I already have.

Continue reading “I have too darn many DVDs”

If you need it, this is the coolest tool ever

We had a partition table wiped at work last night, and I had a hell of a time finding a tool to recover it.

Well, TestDisk does it, and it’s free/GPL. The commercial tool I sometimes use for partition stuff DID have the ability to recover deleted partitions or reconstruct the whole table but didn’t support ReiserFS.

The only downside is that the first version I tried (4.0) while it came on Knoppix (which was very handy) didn’t support current ReiserFS either (it did support Reiser 1 and 2). But the current version (5.5) does, along with a plethora of other file systems (but not XFS, at least not yet.)

Very much worth adding to your toolkit.

A quick technical note

The system was down for upgrades for a couple of hours tonight. Hopefully the memory issues I’ve been having will be fixed, and things won’t be any slower for you folks out there (if anyone’s reading *lol*). Since this is running over a DSL line, I doubt the changes will be noticeable, but there may be some lower performance in the Apache set-up. Let me know if it bugs any of you, and I can try to tweak them up instead.

34 Things to do before Bush’s second inauguration

Taken directly from AMERICAblog

I didn’t write this, don’t know who did. But it’s good. Feel free to add your own:

Some things to do Before the Inaugural:

1. Get that abortion you’ve always wanted.

2. Drink a nice clean glass of water.

3. Cash your social security check.

4. See a doctor of your own choosing.

5. Spend quality time with your draft-age child/grandchild.

6. Visit Syria, or any foreign country for that matter.

7. Get that gas mask you’ve been putting off buying.

8. Hoard gasoline.

9. Borrow books from library before they’re banned – constitutional law books, Catcher in the Rye, Harry Potter, Tropic of Cancer, National Geographic.

10. If you have an idea for an art piece involving a crucifix – do it now.

11. Come out – then go back in – FAST!

12. Jam in all the Alzheimer’s stem cell research you can.

13. Stay out late before the curfews start.

14. Suck up to your neighbors now, BEFORE they turn you in to Homeland Security.

15. Go see Bruce Springsteen before he has his “accident.”

16. Go see Mount Rushmore before the Reagan addition.

17. Use the phrase, “You can’t do that – this is America!”

18. Have that last drink with your Muslim friends.

19. If you’re white, marry a black person; if you’re black, marry a white person; if you’re gay, get married in Massachusetts; if you’re transgendered, move to Canada.

20. Take a walk in Yosemite, without being hit by a snowmobile or a base-jumper.

21. Enroll your kid in an accelerated art or music class.

22. Start your school day without a prayer.

23. Pass on the secrets of evolution to future generations.

24. Learn French (it’ll help you learn German later on).

25. Take a factory tour anywhere in the US.

26. Take photographs of animals on the endangered species list.

27. Take photographs of Democrats.

28. Visit Florida before the polar ice caps melt.

29. Visit Nevada before it becomes radioactive.

30. Visit Alaska before “The Big Spill.”

31. Visit Massachusetts while it is still a State.

32. Download a copy of the Constitution on an encrypted CD-ROM and hide it.

33. Play with a dreidel.

34. Masturbate, before Chief Justice Scalia makes it illegal.

Also found via AMERICAblog today: School sued for awarding cat with MBA

New Zealand rocks…

Seriously, I can’t decide if this is incredibly cool or just sorta cool and incredibly funny…

Sex Industry – A Guide to Occupational Health and Safety in the New Zealand
(per the site being linked to, the document in question contains sexually explicit material.)

WHEN THE PROSTITUTION REFORM BILL WAS BEING CONSIDERED BY THE Justice and Electoral Select Committee, committee members recommended that health and safety guidelines should be developed for the sex industry. As the lead agency responsible for workplace health and safety, the Department of Labour’s Occupational Safety and Health
Service (OSH) led the development of this Guide.
The Prostitution Reform Bill was passed into law on 27 June 2003. This means that the sex industry now operates under the same health and safety rules as any New Zealand industry.

More on Fascist America

The Project for the Old American Century site identifies 14 points in common between fascism and the current administration

Oh, and have a look at this animation linked to from the page above. It’s an interesting take on the military budget — you can also have a look at the WRL “pie chart” for more of a “radical left” view of the military budget. The War Resisters League main page may be worth a look as well.