Dave Mancuso dot Com

There’s a story on Mac Daily News about a USC student who reputedly bought 2,500 Pepsi bottles of soda (pop for you west of Pittsburgh)–with his college semester meal plan? He has pictures to apparently prove it.

OK–but there’s a flaw here. Each user can only redeem 200 songs, according to the giveaway rules (it’s under rule #6, Song Prize Limits). Who did he give the other 2,300 caps to?

The funniest comment on his webpage: “Congratulations–but I hope you redeemed all of those codes that are in your photos before you posted the images. “

Me? Thanks to my wife and her efforts in collecting unwanted caps from her coworkers, I got 53 free songs total. $53 of free songs was more than I’d hoped for–a fun couple of months.

I think that this gets to the core of what I feel about Bush and the 9/11 hearings. I understand if you want to deconstruct the Bush presidency for its failings, but the 9/11 hearing is the wrong forum. Conversely, those who read this as vindication of the Bush presidency as a whole are taking the concept too far out of context. It’s just that 9/11 probably couldn’t have happened any other way–it’s fantasy to suppose otherwise.

I think that the issues to concentrate on are the economic plans, the Patriot Act, and the social issues. Frankly, from a cold-blooded standpoint, 9/11 obfuscated the issue of what the Bush presidency means to America. The previous sentence is asinine, though–9/11 did happen, and it influences everything that goes after. When we vote this year, we vote on our economy, our social issues, our privacy, and our freedom–but also our protection as we go about our lives, and our place in the world among our brethren, politically and religiously. I don’t know if there’s a single votable answer to most, let alone all, of those questions.

If you’re interested in some better reading on the stuff we’ve been discussing, you might take a look at this reviewer’s list on Amazon. Dr. Robinson is one of the few reviewers I’ve seen who have critiqued books intelligently and without partisan subjectivity. A shame you can’t see his extended reviews on the “listmania” page–they’re very well reasoned (and don’t contain the egregious grammar mistakes I see in other reviewer posts–what a turnoff).

I think I’m going to get (or take out of the library) House of Bush, House of Saud next.

‘Cause here’s the new trailer, in full downloadable glory.

It’s worth the download–looks like a good time for all this summer with this flick!

This guy has plans for a $14 Steadicam. A Steadicam is a device you harness to yourself and mount a camera on. Then you film as you’re walking, but the shots come out smooth because the Steadicam absorbs the jerks, dips, and bounces from walking.

If you got a DVX100 (the new videocamera that records at film shutter speed) and had this Steadicam, you’re well on your way to making film-quality movies.

Well, apart from lighting, dollies, sound, and talent, that is. Still, pretty cool.

My opinion about witch hunts over 9/11 notwithstanding, this doesn’t look too good for the White House (despite the fact that this website is anti-conservative, the webpage is well-documented):

Claim vs. Fact: Condoleezza Rice’s Opening Statement

What a shame–everyone loses in this thing, the world’s people most of all.

I wish McCain were running this year.

Ladies and gentlemen, I bring you:

The Subservient Chicken

Feel the power you can have over pseudo-living virtual chickens…yes, endless hours of good, clean fun.

I haven’t had time to try this, but heck–how hard can balancing the federal budget be, anyway?

😉

I mean, my own personal finances are more complex than the budgets of many leading nations already.

Try it out at this site.

Of interest is the “Do Budget Deficits Matter?” link. I’m reformulating my opinions about budget deficits, since I’m realizing more and more that our economy is based on mass psychology anyway (or mob psychology, some might say). Seriously–the gold standard was effectively eliminated in 1933 by FDR–we have only a few drops of gold even in Fort Knox! Our money’s value is based solely on faith in the credit of the United States government. Add that to the fact that our banks lend our ten times the money they actually own (no lie–you’ve never heard of the ten percent law in banking?) and the economy really takes on new meanings.

No wonder the dollar dips in foreign markets when Greenspan gets a cold.

I think that the grammar test in the previous post executes scripts that put spyware on your computer. Kevin called and let me know that three things were installed on his computer after he visited the site (Lycos search bar was one, I think–I forget the other two). Nasty nasty. Kevin said that one clue might have been when several pop-up windows appeared as he submitted the quiz for scoring. I’d never have known, because I was using Safari on a Mac.

Of course, I probably wouldn’t have known on my PC either, because I use Firefox and turn off pop-up windows.

Oh well–a word to the wise, anyway. And if you have a PC, you might want to download a good spyware killer like Spybot.

I caught The Ataris cover of The Boys of Summer today on the new “Cool Pop” 106.7 station around here. You know, speeding up a song and thrashing it around does not mean that you’ve made a cool, inventive cover. And what is up with the “saw a Black Flag sticker on a Cadillac” crap? Way to ruin a great lyric, guys.

At least they seemed competent with their instruments.