I find that there are some pretty wild misconceptions about Barack Obama.

1) Barack is a uniter
In fact, he has been described as the most liberal senator. I'm not sure exactly who people think he is uniting, but it sure doesn't include conservative republicans. Be realistic, folks. He faces an uphill battle to bring about his so-called change, especially if the democrats continue to not have a workable majority in the senate. Barack is not going to simply roll through Washington turning everything he touches into gold.

2) Barack has a better chance against McCain
Maybe. Maybe not. Barack Obama has never really had to deal with the full force neo-con spin machine. Right now, he just has to sell himself to democrats. Taking on the republicans will be a whole new battle. He will be facing the challenge of proving that he is a better person to be Commander in Chief than a decorated war hero who spent 4 years in a POW camp and then went on to become a Senator for 20 years the whole time serving on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Maybe he is, but republicans aren't going down without a fight and they certainly have a strong prima facie case. The point is, Hillary has a history that may be an advantage in the general election.

(I couldn't believe I actually heard this one the other day)
3) Barack voted against the Iraq war
Barack didn't vote at all! He didn't enter the Senate until 2005. AND he's spent the last year campaigning to be president. I admit, Hillary's war authorization vote was wrong, but nobody bats a thousand, and I'll take her experience in the White House over Barack's war "vote" any day. Hmm, come to think of it, I "voted" against the Iraq war too. Maybe I should run for president. I'm not 35, but if I could just get stadiums full of people to cheer me on for blowing my nose, maybe the media and everyone else will just overlook it.

There are certainly some negative misconceptions about him too, but I don't think they even compare to the misconceptions that Hillary has faced and fought for years and years.
4) Barack is a Muslim.
In fact, he is not.

OK, that's enough for now.

Cross-posted on facebook.

Once again, Ohio is likely to play a decisive role in choosing the next president. It is as important as ever that we make the right choice.

It's not difficult to see why so many people are attracted to Obama. He's an inspiring speaker and for many people a welcome fresh face in the political arena. For too many years Washington has been dominated by a few very powerful men. Congress seems bought and sold and the media seems sort of OK with that. The point being OF COURSE Obama is an appealing candidate for president. After eight years of neo-cons in office, many Americans are starving for "change" and Obama is just what they were looking for.

But is he really the best person for the job? Obama says having the "same old folks" in Washington would be a mistake, but who exactly is he talking about? Clearly (at least to most of us) we don't need any more neo-cons in office. Been there. Done that. Didn't work. (Which rules out McCain since he seems to be towing the neo-con lines now). But what about Clinton? Surely Obama doesn't mean to imply that there is no difference between Hillary Clinton and George W. Bush. This is absurd on its face. So what then is his argument against Clinton? Is he really trying to convince us that we all hated the Clintons? Bill Clinton's approval ratings were in the 60s (percent) when he left office (even after dealing with scandal). The fact is, many Americans really liked Bill and Hillary Clinton. If that isn't it, is Obama trying to say that just having experience in politics is a bad thing? Come on people. How did this get to "Experience == Bad"? It goes without saying (but I'll say it anyways) intimate experience in Washington politics is a *major asset.* A president only has so many years to be effective. Why wouldn't you want the candidate with the most experience?

The answer is politics. If you don't agree with a candidate's politics, even if he is the most experienced, you shouldn't vote for him. This is why I won't vote for John McCain in the general election. His resume speaks for itself, but I just don't agree with his politics. The problem is, Obama and Clinton have virtually the same politics. They agree on almost every issue. This brings me to my point: all things being equal in terms of politics, you should choose the candidate with more experience (and thus more potential to be effective). Yes, I like Obama. No matter what happens, he will certainly continue to be an influential figure in national politics. Still, there is *no question* in my mind that Clinton is more prepared for the job.

Let's all practice the lesson we all hoped we learned after the 2000 general election: this is not about electing a Prom King (or Queen) or about deciding who we'd rather have a beer with. The choice each of us have to make is who do we think can most effectively apply our values to Washington policy. If Obama resonates with your values, then *you should vote for Clinton*. She can (and will) more effectively implement *Obama's* values than Obama can.

The only person who could be more effective than Clinton would be Al Gore, but that's another story.

x-posted on facebook

Tags: 2008 presidential election, barak obama, hillary clinton, politics

I found this today while reading Wikipedia's article on Conservapedia. It's a satirical alternative to Conservapedia called Liberapedia.

When I'm drunk I'm zero sober.

Can you make tea out of apples?

So we had a wierd SQL problem at work that we just solved today. We were running an UPDATE query something like:

UPDATE Schedule

SET InterimReport='Some text blah',
InterimGrade='ME',
FinalReport='Some more text',
FinalGrade='EE',
ICName='Text Here'

WHERE StudentID='985' AND
CourseOfferingID='1601'


The query ran fine without returning any errors, but the database just didn't seem to get updated. Can anyone guess what the problem is? It would probably be more obvious if I gave more context, but whatever.

Hahaha. Penn Jillette just said "There is no Santa Clause" on The Colbert Report, and the beeped out the words "Santa Clause." Also said "The tooth fairy is your mother and your father" and they beeped "your mother and your father."

Wow. My best friend (best friends I should say) are married now. We always knew it was coming, just not this soon. I still can't believe it. At first I wasn't sure what to think. But now I'm really happy for them. They're a great couple and they really deserve each other. The wedding was really nice. We all walked down the aisle to the Aeris Theme from FF7, except for Kellagh (the bride) who walked in to the them from Laputa (a Miyazaki movie). Later I got nervous and didn't give my toast on time. I ended up giving it in front of a smaller crowd though, I guess it was OK. All in all a really fun (albeit long) day. I'm happy for Mike and Kellagh, but I'm going to miss him as a roommate. Se la vi.

listen up bitches.

all we are saying, is give peace a chance.

how do you like them bananas?!

<rant>
I hereby forbid the use of the word "whilst." It seems to be used often in geek-dom, and no, it does not make you sound clever. You are not clever because you know an archaic word that can technically be substituted for its modern equivalent.
</rant>

Keyboard failure
Strike F1 to continue



yeeeeahhhh