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Bush: We’re Sending the Wrong Message

Our fearless King has said stated that the UAE – the government set to take over the ports in the U.S. – is a comendable friend, and great ally to fight terrorism since 9/11/01.

The truth of the matter is that prior to 9/11, the UAE helped to facilitate the financial transactions for the 9/11 hijackers, supported the Tailban in Afghanistan, and had two of the nineteen hijackers come from the UAE.

Since Congress has told King Bush that there would be no way to get this port deal to pass, and even if he did veto it, Congress would have the 2/3’s majority needed to override his veto.

In response, Bush has said that by not allowingthe UAE to manage our ports, we, as Americans are sending the wrong message to our Arab friends. He says we’re saying “it’s ok for a non-Arab company to run our ports, but it’s not ok for an Arab company to do it.” Two important points here. One, it is not simply an Arab country that would have controlled the ports. It’s the UAE GOVERNMENT. Secondly, we’re so worried about what messages we’re sending out. How about worrying about some of the messages we’re receiving.

King Bush has – for as week now – told us that we’re sending the wrong message. He really needs to drop it, because it’s really becoming offensive at this point.

The best thing to happen in his entire presidency so far is this ports deal got shot down.

And speaking about “the messages we’re sending” [by not allowing the UAE to manage our ports], it can’t be any worse then invading soveirgn nations under false pretenses, killing thousands of civilians, and torturing their prisoners. Yeah, that’s not sending the wrong message.

Don’t stop at Censure – Impeach Bush, now. Before it’s too late.

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Don’t Blame Me When the T-1 Goes Down

I don’t work in the IT department at my day job, but yet I do work in the company’s largest national branch in an unrelated field. We do not have any on-site IT staff – the closest we have is Totowa, NJ. Easily doable in 90 minutes, but if something goes wrong, most likely it won’t be resolved quickly.

It’s funny too, because our business is healthcare. If our computers are down, it’s really hard to dispense medication and ship product to patients.

In the last month or so, the IT department has changed. Actually, they used to call them self the “MIS Department”, but they later changed that to the more cool-sounding “IT Department”, or “Information Technology”. Part of the whole new IT department is upgrading the per-branch circuit capacity of their Internet connection. Instead of most branches having fractionated T-1’s, each branch is given a T-1 for data and another T-1 for voice.

I’m the guy in the branch that knows the most about computers, so everyone comes to me for help. I help when I can, but for the really big shit, I pull the reins in a bit, and say “whoa, someone has to come out here to do this.”

This was the case this week. Dave, an IT Engineering Field Tech from our Totowa branch e-mailed me and asked me to work with him today to remove a WIC card from our router, replace it with a new WIC card, and run a cat5 cable through the dropped ceilings to the new Verizon-supplied T1’s. (For those non-technical people, the hardest part would be running the wire up the wall, through the dropped ceiling and into the router. Removing the WIC card from the router (about the size of a credit card) only involves unscrewing it at two points, sliding it out, sliding another one in, and rescrewing the card back in. If you’ve ever added a PCI card to your computer to expand the capability of it, doing what I was asked to do today was 100x easier.)

At first I said sure, no problem. Then, I thought about it. I’m not in IT, but they want me to take down the whole router, run cat5 cable, and basically be responsible for the state of the Internet connection during the work.

I thought about this for an hour or so, e-mail Dave back and said “Hey man, I’m not trying to be a dick. But this is a biggie you’re asking me to do. I mean, potentially the system may not come back up, and I don’t know the first thing about Cisco routers. I’m going to have to get it in writing from someone at IT (Kal, April, whoever) that they’re OK’ing me to do this, and I’m not responsible for broken equipment or extended T1 downtime.”

Dave e-mails me back…”Are you kidding around or are you serious? I’m just trying to save myself from coming out there…besides, the ISDN should come back up when the T1 goes down…”.

My reply: “Well, people are getting tossed out of this branch for much less then taking the T1 down. I’m really going to have to insist that you come out here for this. I’ll help you as much as I can, but you’ll be driving the bus. And as far as the ISDN, I don’t have too much faith in that. In theory, the ISDN is supposed to come up as the T1 goes down…”

Of course Dave couldn’t get that in writing for me, so instead of me saving him a trip to Long Island from NJ, he had to come out here today. And a good thing he did too, because the upgrade failed. Almost two hours of downtime today because the IT Enginneer in Chicago who gave him the new code for the new WIC card for the Cisco router gave him the wrong code. It was for the wrong WIC card. So the old WIC card didn’t work and the new WIC card wouldn’t work.

When I asked Dave “Are you ok?” as I see beads of sweat dripping off his face in the 85 degree server room, he says “I’m in a world of shit.”

Oh, and the ISDN did not come up. 🙂

He finally called a senior network engineer (Kal), who, mind you had a day off today, and after hooking up the router to accept incoming connections via remote dialup, was able to get new code to the new WIC card so the router now worked with our new T1.

If Dave hadn’t come today and I did the work, not only would the connection still be down, but the router wasn’t properly hooked up to the remote dial-in component, making remote help impossible. We would have been stuck, and I most likely would have been fired.

Sorry to bore everyone here with my trivial nonsense, but the moral of this story is that always go with your gut instincts regarding a decision. If you think something isn’t right with a situation, you’re probably right. In order to get to the correct situation, you may have to inconvienence and/or piss someone off.

In this case, Dave had to take 1/2 a day to drive to Long Island and back, but heck, it all worked out in the end.

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Don Knotts [1924-2006]

Actor Don Knotts died Friday, Feb 24th in Los Angeles. A truly irreplaceable comic, Knotts made people laugh all his life. Granted, I caught him near the end of his career rather than at the beginning, as I was a huge Three’s Company fan from the day that show started until the day it ended. Knotts played Ralph Furley, the charismatic landlord for Jack (John Ritter), Chrissy (Suzanne Somers), and Janet (Joyce DeWitt).

It’s a tad frightening to see famous people go, even if their old. Three’s Company was a show I watched regularly throughout the 1980s, and even on re-runs years later. Heck, I own the DVDs to the show, and it’s as funny now as it was then. Sadly, with John Ritter dying unexpectedly in 2003, and now Don Knotts, two comedic geniouses are gone, but in better places.

For more information on Don Knotts, please see his entry at the IMDB (Internet Movie Database).

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Cheney, an Earthquake in Jersey, and Safe Ports

So a lot has happened in the last week. VP Dick Cheney shot someone in the face. This person then apologized for being in his way. Something is fishy there; doesn’t the burden of proof/responsibility rely on the shooter? Something tells me that perhaps Cheney might have been drinking, and this might be one big “cover up” to protect his job?

Next, an earthquake in northern New Jersey registered 2.6, just barely enough for humans to feel.

And yesterday it was announced that an UAE (United Arab Emirates) firm has won a contract to take over 6 U.S. seaports, from Boston to Miami. Umm…hello? Did we just give control over what goes in and out of a port to a country that has sponsored terrorism? We did. Two of the alleged 9/11 hijackers came from the UAE, and money laundered for 9/11 was found linked to banks within the UAE. How is it that Bush has allowed a firm in a country linked to terrorism to gain control over what goes in and out of American ports?

Sure, people will say I have a political agenda, or I’m not being PC, but this is what I say. Go fuck yourself. We should not be relinquishing control of these ports to any foreign government, much less a government with a less than steller record on terrorism.

Call me crazy, but I hope someone puts a stop to it. Luckily, there is quite a bit of bipartisan objection to the UAE firm gaining control, but it sounds like it’s falling on deaf ears at the white house. Apparently, if the President doesn’t listen, those against this contract stated that they will try and freeze the contract. We’ll see what happens.

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Bareback Mounting

What is it with this movie Brokeback Mountain? I mean, what’s the big deal? So, the guys are gay. How is this movie different than any other love story. Granted, I probably won’t go see this movie while it’s out in the theatre, but I’ll probably make it a Netflix rent when it comes out on DVD. This being said, why the big fuss? Because it’s two gay guys in a love story rather than a man and a woman? Don’t we all have something better to do then to make a big production out of love between a couple? Whether it be a man and a woman, a woman and a woman, or a man and man, what is the big deal?

While this movie may be good and indeed well acted, directed, and produced, I fear that too much attention is being made to the general issue of sexuality. I think the media response to this movie exemplifies our cultural issues with sexuality and homosexuality, similarly to how other movies show our issues with racism and violence.

Anywho, that’s my rant. For those with a comedic bone in them, check out the links below related to Brokeback Mountain, or “Bareback Mounting” as I like to call it.

Broke Mac Mountain
Broke Back To The Future
BrokeBack Top Gun

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Blizzard of 2006

I thought the Winter here on Long Island was never going to come. It hasn’t been warm. It hasn’t been snowy, though we have had a lot of rain. It even rained on Christmas and on New Years. It snowed once, but it was a bullshit 4 inches back a few weeks ago.

And then this weekend hit. NYC got more than 23 inches of snow, and out here on Long Island, we got close to 30 inches. I think the news said that it 23 inches was the second largest snowfall in NYC since they started keeping records, which date back to the mid 1800’s.

As luck would have it, I snuck into NYC last night to see “Wicked”, and instead of staying in NYC (for fear that the Long Island Rail Road would shut down), I left NYC last night and came back to the Island. As it turns out, trains still did run, even through all that snow.

The familar “On or close to schedule” message for those familiar with the LI double R. (Thissss is the train to Huntington….stopping at….Woodside, Kew Gardens, The Hillside Facility, Carle Place, Mineola, Westbury, Hicksville, Syosset, Cold Spring Harbor, and Huntington. Change at Jamaica for the train to Brooklyn and all other stations. Please help us with our clean train campaign, and desposit all garbage in the recepticles on the station platforms. Once again, this is the train to Huntington. All aboard!!)

Anywho, at my house was a decent 25 – 30 inches of snow, which took me about 2 hours to snowblow as it’s a bit on the long side. Winter finally decided to show up, and it’ll be interesting to see if they plowed the parking lot at work when I show up tomorrow late. 🙂

Both Old Man Winter Mother Nature musta worked together on this SOB storm, because it was a dooozy.

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SuperBowl XL & Laundry

Seattle Seahawks vs. Pittsburgh Steelers.
2/5/2006
Detroit, Michigan.

I didn’t really have a whole heck of a lot of time this year to actually watch the game. Actually, I hardly watched any football the whole year. I caught about 15 mins of a game back in the beginning of January. It’s not that I dislike football, it’s just I’d rather play Xbox, or do something else. At any rate, I make an effort to watch the Superbowl every year, but this year I had a lot of work to do around here that was time sensitive (like clean underwear for work on Monday AM), so in lieu of going out or to a friend’s house to watch it, I just watched it here at my place as I tended to other things.

And boy, am I glad I did.

Between a horrible first quarter, atrocious refereeing, some poor play calling, and a less than stellar Rolling Stones performance, I’m glad I wasn’t paying all that much attention to the game like I normally would have. That being said, I also missed out on a lot of the cool commercials, which is one reason I watch the game to begin with. Not to worry though, here are some links that offer all of the commercials for viewing in case you missed them:

Google Video
Superbowl-Ads.com
AOL’s Superbowl Ads Videos

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Freedom of Speech Violated Again

Cindy Sheehan, anti-war protestor is escorted out of the State of the Union Address & Arrested

President Bush’s cronies have done it once again. Cindy Sheehan, popular anti-war and anti-administration protestor was escorted out of the State of the Union Address on 1/31/06 for wearing a t-shirt, and was later arrested for the same offesne. A second woman, Beverly Young, wife of U.S. Rep Bill Young (R) of Florida, was also escorted out of the State of the Union address. Both women, wearing t-shirts that voiced a simple opinion were told to leave.

Sheehan’s t-shirt said: “2,245 Dead. How many more?”
Young’s t-shirt said: “Support the Troops.”

U.S. Capitol Police have later apologized to both women, and are recommending that all charges be dropped against Sheehan.

However, the issue is larger than “a simple mistake in protocol”. It is evidence yet again of mere dissention and disagreement with the viewpoint of the current administration will result in the stifling of your opinion, and being arrested for wearing a piece of clothing expressing a point of view.

Simply disagreeing with the Bush Administration is a punishable offense.

People, let’s wake the hell up and get this guy out of office. It’s ok to say that the emporer has no clothes.

P.S. – Don’t get me wrong, I think Cindy Sheehan’s meeting with Hugo Chavez this week discussing the toppling of the U.S.Empire might be construed as treason, so for that I would tend to disagree with her. That being said, she had a son who fought and died in Iraq, which makes her point of view much more riviting and passionate then mine.

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Billy Joel in NYC

A few days ago, I had the great pleasure of seeing (for the first time) Billy Joel perfom live. He played at Madison Square Garden in NYC, close to his home town. It was, by far, one of the most amazing musical experiences of my life. He played for about 3 hours, playing most songs I knew (and I’m not even a hardcore fan). His performance was so well refined, so crisp, and so awesome that words can almost not describe it.

He played to a sold-out crowd, and just added a 12th show in NYC at the end of February.

There is one thing that I’d like to mention — this was the first concert I’ve been to in a long time where the crowd was mostly older than myself. At one point during the concert, a younger fan – around my age – stood up and started to grove to the music a little. Shortly after he did that, a woman fan – about 50 years old – asked him to sit down. And he did. I looked at that, as I sort of saw the whole thing happen. I was reading facial expressions; the kid couldn’t believe he was asked to sit down, and the woman looked like she couldn’t believe that he couldn’t believe that he was asked to sit down. None the less, he reluctantly sat down and about 15 minutes later, he stood right the hell up again. That was pretty awesome too. 🙂

Oh, and the audience practically sung “Piano Man” for Billy. That was kinda cool, too.

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Challenger: 20 Years Later

The Challenger Crew

It was twenty years ago that the NASA Space Shuttle Challenger exploded shortly after liftoff. I was 10, and I was in 5th grade. I don’t even really remember if I was watching the launch with my fellow classmates or not. I don’t know if that’s because it was 20 years ago, or if something has blocked my memory of it.

I definately remember watching the TV later that night when I got home, looking at the replays of it on the evening news. It was an exceptionally sad day for me–even at 10 and younger, I watched the Shuttle launch every time. Each time it went up, it was spectacular. Even as a child, I understood that it was an amazing achievement of man and machine, yet without a knowledge of “the real world” much less engineering, I didn’t understand the risks and thus it made the whole experience a bit more confusing for a 10 year old interested in baseball and bikes.

It’s interesting to look back, see the improvements and adjustments made, and notice that a few years after Challenger, we were back flying the shuttles again. Arguably, any space travel has risks, and no matter what improvements are made, mistakes will be found, catastrophic events will continue, and the element of risk will not be eliminated.

It’s been 20 years since Challenger explode, and almost 3 years since Columbia disintegrated over the Western U.S. upon re-entry. Life is not without risk, and space travel is no exception to the rule. The best that can be done is to honor those that risked their lives in the interest of science, and to establish a culture of safety and caucious optimism to limit the chance of major malfunctions on future missions.

I was born in 1975, and soon after that, the Space Shuttle Enterprise made it’s maiden test-flight for aerodynamics, followed by the first flight by the first fully operational shuttle, Columbia in 1981. The remaining shuttles (Discovery, Atlantis & Endeavour) are due to be decomissioned after 2010, until then used soley to fix, maintain, and expand the ISS. In 2010, I’ll be 35. I will have lived through an entire generation of major space successes, and two catostrophic failures. I feel honored to have lived through its birth, its growth, and its presumed passing, when a new space vehicle will begin its life to continue Man’s reach for the stars.

For those that want to continue reading, both MSNBC and CNN have produced interesting and informative pieces celebrating and commemorating the Challenger and its crew. They write about the more human aspects of the disaster, not so much the events themselves. They also talk about myths that people might still believe as root causes of the accident. Below are the links.

CNN.com – Remembering Challenger
MSNBC.com – Twenty Years After Challenger

We will never forget them, nor the last time we saw them, this morning, as they prepared for their journey and waved good-bye and ‘slipped the surly bonds of Earth’ to ‘touch the face of God. – Former President Ronald Reagan.