Mainly because it looks kinda cool, but also because I like uploading pictures to this site, here is an NOAA picture comparing a normal night on the east coast (left) to last night (right).

On another point, I know that many people think that the blackout shows that our grid is succeptible to terrorism. I disagree. If none of our electicity experts can figure out what happened yesterday, I am pretty sure that Osama ain’t got a clue how to make it happen again.

It looks like Larry Flynt may be the only respectable candidate after all. The right took a swing at Arianna today pointing to the fact that she” paid less in taxes”:http://www.latimes.com/news/yahoo/la-me-ariannatax14aug14,0,3462013.story?coll=la-newsaol-headlines last year ($800) than most of us normal folks did. As a closet altruist, I have been cosidering not claiming some deductions next year because I think the governemnt needs the money. (Think of it as a tax-free charitable donation!) I can’t fault Arianna, though, for claiming legitimate deducstions. My problem is with a couple statements she makes.

Huffington said…that her ex-husband…pays “generous” child support for their two daughters.

She wants to suggest that her former Republican congressman husband, Michael Huffington, paid the taxes for that income. I find it hard to believe that Michael Huffington didn’t find plenty of welfare-for-the-wealthy deductions to avoid those pesky taxes himself. What really bothers me is this quote about sending her children to private instead of public schools :

I’m not going to use my children as guinea pigs. I’m going to give them the best education possible.

If/when I have kids, they will go to the nearest public school and anything lacking in their education will be reinforced by me and my wife. That is what personal responsibility means. Sending your children to private schools with the understanding that someone else can take care of them while you write your next Republican/husband bashing speech or book is just not right.

From The Onion , another fair and balanced publication…

“I’ve still got two years to get laid and join the majority,” Ellis said. “I mean, I’ve heard guys talking about all the girls they’ve slept with, but I thought they were just making it up. Turns out, everyone really was having sex all that time. Well, thanks, 20/20. Now I know what a complete loser I am.”

The new buzzwords around the IT(Information Technologies) department I work in are “Work Life Balance”. This is manager-speak for a couple issues:

• Letting employees feel some control over their work environment like giving flex time, or allowing work at home.
• Making sure employees spend enough time away from the office on something non-work related so they don’t get burned out.

Fed Ex Pilot Found Not Guilty for not paying income tax

_ A highly trained and educated federal prosecutor in Memphis was unable to convince 12 American citizens that Vernice Kuglin was required to pay federal income taxes. He was clearly unable to produce a single section of the Tax Code to that end, and the jury was unanimous in clearing Kuglin of all charges against her._

Wacky. Here’s hoping for a fair and balanced tax code someday.

UPDATE – New link added

Dan Hamburg . Too bad the site’s from the 1998 election. Pulsating green graphics, and a grey haired dude with a ponytail.

So I found Jose Camejo’s site to get a Green Party candidate for today. Want to make sure we stay fair and balanced. But clicking on his 10 key values only brings up a list of questions, such as “How can we further biocentric wisdom in all spheres of life?”

I honestly like the following two planks –

How can we resolve personal and intergroup conflicts without just turning them over to lawyers and judges?
How can we redesign our institutions so that fewer decisions and less regulation over money are granted as one moves from the community to the national level?

This guy’d be great to drink with … Only 5 hours ‘till beer…

This article from The Kansas City Star offers really usefull tips to the people of North America who are suffering from the blackout.

The range of experience they offer is insightful.

• SIT IN THE SHADE
• GET A GENERATOR
• TAKE TO THE STREETS

Direct quotes from the Iraq people offer sage concepts.

• “They should go where it isn’t so hot.”
• “We sleep on the roof. It’s cooler there.”
• “When it’s hot people buy a lot of ice.”

And best of all they share a helpful attitude.

• “I curse God. I curse Saddam Hussein. And I curse the Americans.”
• “I hope it lasts for 20 years. Let them feel our suffering.”
• “Let them sit outside drinking tea and smoking cigarettes waiting for the power to come back, just like the Iraqis.”

I confess that I generally am not a huge fan of the blog concept. For the most part they seem self-indulgent. A good blog is hard to find.

However, the Julie/Julia Project blog on Salon is a great example of how fun a blog can be. It was profiled in the NY Times this week, which is how I found it. But I went back and started reading from the beginning, and it is hilarious…

The most “Fair and Balanced” thing at BpB may be me, Rick Reeder. Not only am I fair-skinned (see my Hawaii album at clubphoto.com – look it up with my Dell email address), but I rarely fall down. Verifiable empirical proof that I am balanced. Or at least that I possess balance.

Nicolas Kristof on America’s current Great Awakening.

It turns out that Hurricane names are not “Fair and Balanced” afterall. Every ethnic group should be allowed to be represented in chaos and destruction.

The congressional newspaper the Hill reported this week that Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, feels that the current names are too “lily white,” and is seeking to have better representation for names reflecting African-Americans and other ethnic groups.

An article at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette (yes, that’s what I said) discusses fair and balanced alternatives for your music magazine fix after your Rolling Stone subscription expires. I would have let mine expire years ago but somehow I was on a four-year sub that is just now about to end. I don’t agree with the writers distaste of the unclad and sexed-up status (but I agree with overhyped and they may be undertalented, but their producers rock) of Britney, … Justin, Christina, … Eminem, [and] Madonna but I do agree that I can’t be bothered to listen to Whitney, J-Lo, … Mariah, and Celine. Either way, though, Rolling Stone has become US Weekly for music and I think music is too personal a choice to get bogged down in the personal lives of the artists. (While mass-market TV and movies are generally so-much-candy and I love the weekly gossip in my US and Entertainment Weekly subscriptions.) Summarily, he’s got a good list of mags (and I have heard people I respect say that you should buy every copy of Oxford American CD that you can lay your hands on — escpecially now that they’ve suspended publication) but he should have thrown CMJ in there. It’s a good price for 12 CDs of stuff that will be on the ‘alternative’ radio next month.

In the interest of a little ‘Fair and Balanced’ coverage of the latest hack to plague Microsoft (which, to be completely fair and balanced did do a great service by providing a common platform to spur growth, but whose time has past with the adoption of standards based platforms), I’d like to provide this suggestion back to Redmond about a quick and easy way to avoid the Blaster:

Switch to OS X or Linux.

(Inspired by the tech support e-mail that Microsoft left in my inbox this morning, included in the extended entry)