This was just funny...

...even if it is a pitch:

My Liberal Identity:

You are a Reality-Based Intellectualist, also known as the liberal elite. You are a proud member of what’s known as the reality-based community, where science, reason, and non-Jesus-based thought reign supreme.

Take the quiz at www.FightConservatives.com

I have nothing...

i really have nothing to say. i'm feeling very odd this evening. school rocks though i got my new textbooks for the next session and they intimidate me. Multiplexing? sigh...

:-)

Hope you're all enjoying today as much as I am! :-)

Brown thumb anyone?

Ok, this thing is sooooo COOL! I love plants and apparently I love torturing them as I have managed to kill more than I've kept alive (though I have 5 houseplants that have survived despite my care for YEARS now and my balcony does manage to look pretty in the summer). But this might help me figure out how to stop killing them! Basically, you stick this gadget into the soil and the output is soil quality, plant health and suggestions! How awesome is that?!?! I can now keep on killing the plants but at least I'll know WHY they're dying! :D

So tired...

I'm almost giddy....I was up so late last night working on homework. I actually enjoyed most of my homework this weekend - not sure why all of a sudden it felt like less of a burden...It was more interesting - as I'm finding the IT program to be - and a little tough coordinating with my group-mates....

Its so very cold here - very wintry...

So far I've downed two soy lattes (and, C, don't go there with the origins of soy milk, ok? BTW - I'm ensuring that I mention you at least every few days so I don't get Juan showing up on my guestbook bitching. He can be such a whiner at times), working on a sugar-free Rockstar and then I've got an Amp waiting for me....I hope this will keep me awake until I get home...and then I have a feeling I'm just going to crash....

I don't have much to say really....
Can't talk about the things I want to right now...
Don't feel like talking about the things I can....

Melancholy...

The sunset trees and the the waning daylight obvious reminders of the changing season. I'm tired today and needing to tend to my homework. Finding distractions though really there is a fundamental distraction that isn't a distraction at all. Just getting focused or at least trying to....Does this make sense? Hardly matters....

Anyway...i should get on with it....

October's Playlist

Just a handful of songs that I've been listening to lately...

Enjoy....

Amp Hug...

Sare gave me an Amp Hug today. I walked into the office today and found this semicircle of Amp - like a little Amp Hug - waiting for me! It was so nice...

Sometimes I think I drink the copious amounts of Amp in hopes that I will get inebriated. LOL. It would make the day so much more palatable....sigh...And then i just might forget why I hate so much..LMAO...sorry, i'm in a mood today....

I will have to get creative and give Sare a return hug.....Of what exactly, I do not know....

Sare in da news...

Check out Sarah's interview in the Digital Life column of the ChicagoTribune.com! Way to go Ms. Thang!

Good day....or is it?

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

Its Monday and rainy....I hate Mondays, love the rain...Its very cold today and I'm really feeling it....One would think I'd be warm with all the energy drinks I've consumed today....lol....but no, just wired and cold....

So Staind, Seether and Papa Roach are touring! I want to go!!!! But I got myself terribly confused with the dates (that's a big surprise, eh?) - they're here in Rockford in two days but I can't go to that concert but they're coming back in December and I'm hoping to go....











On my playlist today:

Goooood Morning! :-)

Tell me baby, what's your story?

Woke up in a stupidly good mood...though this has been happening these last few days....

Had a great time yesterday with the family. Got my paws on Riley for an excessive amount of time - I swear that kid is simply the cutest little thing in the world. I'm nuts about her.

I have massive homework to do today but I don't feel like doing a damn thing....

On today's playlist:

The Terminally Stupid Support McInSane

Wow..."An Al Jazeera camera crew caught the honest sentiments of McCain/Palin supporters at an Ohio rally...." - its embarrassing how stupid these people are and how happily they flaunt their ignorance....

The article courtesy of MC....Thanks!

AdSense Nonsense?

Or maybe not....

Not sure what it is about my blog that makes Google think I need a "rest". And by "rest" I mean that the men in the white coats are going to forcibly take me away where i will be locked in a small padded room - where they'll take my shoe laces and I'm only allowed play-dough and edible paint....and I'll have to wear those drafty hospital gowns that always have that funny smell and a really hideous pattern.

The ads (that image is just way too small) are for Brookhaven Retreat which is described as a place for "residential mood disorder treatment" while the other ad seems to think I need to "Raise Your Serotonin"....hmmmmm.....

On the bright side maybe they'll give me chocolate pudding and take me for walks....

-p[ (my plush liver just fell off my monitor stand and typed that for you)....

Now that I think about it maybe those ads aren't so much for me, as they are for YOU for reading all this crap (or carp as I keep typing today. the typos are killing me).

I need more sleep.

Playing for me today:

OMG! I WANT ONE!!! (Or admiting I have a problem is the first step, right?)

Chumby.

I want it...

I need it...

I must have it.....

A Chumby of my own....sigh...By my bedside, keeping me company during the long, lonely nights....Mmmmm...
Chumby...

I know I am a electronic gadget junkie. I want one of everything. If I can turn it on, it can turn me on (ok that sounded worse than what I intended - LOL)...Its a sickness...

Taken from the Chumby web site: "Chumby takes your favorite parts of the Internet and delivers them to you in a friendly, always-on, always-fresh format. It's a window into your Internet life that lives outside your desktop, so content like weather, news, celebrity gossip, podcasts, music, and more has a place to play away from your world of documents and spreadsheets."

@$^%*@$&!!!

I have no patience. I am so sick and tired of receiving forwards. And its not just the "cutesy" ones that force me to hold down that veggie burger I had for lunch. I'll even admit to chuckling at a few of the funny ones I've received over the years. But its the stupid ones that really get me. The ones that spread lies and b.s. - as if our world isn't filled with enough - these morons have nothing better to do than to regurgitate the mindless drivel they've just swallowed...


There are a TON of resources available to you. Do your homework. I realize that doing actual "work" requires effort - unlike sitting back and being spoon fed idiocy via the internet, your inbox and your television...But I promise that a little thought won't hurt you - but stupidity KILLS...

Today's assault came in the form of an email attributing some long winded America should be thankful speech to David Letterman. A quick Google search found me at one of my favorite websites, Snopes. Specifically: http://www.snopes.com/politics/soapbox/hitnail.asp

Now, yes, I think we in America, should be thankful for what we do have - we have a lot. But that shouldn't mean complacency. It should mean that we continue to strive for improvement. We need to improve our impact upon the environment improve our contributions to the world, improve ourselves....AND STOP BEING SO IGNORANT...

...sigh....

Moody...

I'm in a mood...Its some strange kind of melange of a variety of different moods - ranging from an almost giddiness to a very angst-y longing feeling...sigh...Thankfully its a reasonably good mood overall but still - it nags a little...its a little tedious...

Personality...

I've just been told what a great personality I have. How nice. Though I think that great personalities are ugly peoples coping mechanisms. Don't get all huffy on me. Attractive people can have good personalities too. LMAO. Sorry, i'm in a mood this evening. Not sure what the hell is going on.

I think i'm just a little loopy from the constant homework and the lack of lad torture (the audios)!!! I'm seriously not happy when i'm not harassing scammers by telephone or email...its a sickness, i know...

I hate being too busy to hang out at my favorite web site (yeah, its not my own, lol). I think I am going through withdrawal. :-(

Well that's it for me tonight. I must get my homework finished up and get on to bed. Wow. This life is just a thrill a minute...

Buns of Leadership! LMAO!!!

This had me in stitches today. I know, I'm easily amused and all...but no really, this is funny...Enjoy!




LOL:

My diploma...

Finally arrived and I finally figured out why they were sending me those damn cords with the tassels. LOL. Apparently they are something called honor cords.

I thought they were to hang yourself with now that the student loans are going to come due....

Welcome Camryn!

Today my family got a little larger and certainly a lot happier as Camryn Isabel was born to my niece Sarah and her boyfriend Jacob. Cammy (as I like to call her) is their second child and younger sister of Logan. Without further ado, here she is:



And pics:

http://s442.photobucket.com/albums/qq144/JaFo19/?albumview=slideshow

A video response...

In all of my reading i found this response:



Enjoy - i know i did.

Response to video - part deux.....

As I am delving deeper into all of this I'm learning quite a bit. I want to make yet another point about the CRA when it comes to Clinton's involvement with it in the 90's - all that Clinton did to the CRA was require that only numerical data be utilized when getting a CRA rating. That's it.

Ok, back to the video. It likes to claim it is being banned because of its political message...sigh...This just tires me - kinda like that Illuminati, Freemason,
CNN logo thing from a couple of months back. From what I can gather, the video was removed for COPYRIGHT issues. The internet is ripe with copyright infringement. I know this first hand (I'm also the copyright agent at work - yet another hat). And I have been accused of stepping all over someone's right to free speech because they've blatantly stolen and used someone elses work without permission or credit...sigh..


Now on to McCain's "co-sponsorship" of the bill that was to have helped. The bill they are referring to is S190:

Some people have actually claimed that the present crisis would have been averted if “McCain’s bill” had passed. We have to stop right there. McCain did not even believe that the scope of the bill could have such an effect when he endorsed it. The bill was written in response to an accounting scandal that rocked Freddie Mack and Fannie Mae. In the best of all circumstances the bill would have helped avert (this is hotly contested) the bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mack, but that had happened before the current crisis.

"In his speech in which he announced his sponsorship a year and a quarter after the bill was introduced, he said:

Mr. President, this week Fannie Mae’s regulator reported that the company’s quarterly reports of profit growth over the past few years were “illusions deliberately and systematically created” by the company’s senior management, which resulted in a $10.6 billion accounting scandal.

He does in his concluding sentence allude to problems for the economy if effective regulations are not implemented but this was not the focus of the speech at all." (taken from: http://northwestlaw.wordpress.com/2008/09/30/s-190-it-has-attained-myth-status/).

So again, the video is wrong and misleading. This kind of inflammatory rhetoric is getting old...

Ok, moving on...

That Obama received monies from Fannie Mae is wrong. "On the Freddie and Fannie question, it as McCain said: Obama is No. 2 on the list, with $126,349, right after Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, who had $165,400.

Corporations cannot give to candidates, so the center's list adds up contributions from Fannie and Freddie employees and their families. Obama has received a lot of money during his presidential campaign, though, and Fannie and Freddie don't make his list of top 20 companies.

The New York Times looked at contributions from Fannie and Freddie's boards of directors and lobbyists, who are technically not employees. That analysis found Fannie and Freddie-related contributors gave $169,000 to John McCain and his related committees, compared with $16,000 to Obama and his related committees." (taken from: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/727/).

So more bull....anyone tired of this yet? I know I am....

And then the video goes into education and inner city schools? Ummm...And it appears to only be to bash Obama - which is where it really started getting bad. I'm sorry, stick to your guns and back up your points, don't try to shift the topic (sound like a Palin move anyone????) and ENERGY divert ENERGY from ENERGY the ENERGY subject at hand....

Then it tries to go back to blaming the CRA - which we have already established is not to blame...sigh....At about 9 minutes the video starts to go sappy on me and I have to pause it. Early on I shut the music off as it was just annoying...And then as it goes on to promote McSame it encourages people to SPAM a link to it. Now that REALLY PISSES me off. LMAO. I get so worked up about spam in any form. Had I seen that from the beginning I wouldn't have been able to watch it all the way through!!

Sources:

http://womeninbusiness.about.com/od/womenspolitics/a/cra-lie-truths.htm

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/10/3/191631/869


http://boards.fool.com/Message.asp?mid=27045007


http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2008/09/cra.html

http://northwestlaw.wordpress.com/2008/09/30/s-190-it-has-attained-myth-status/

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/727/

Response to stupid YouTube video...Part 1 - The CRA

Let me preface this by saying that I am neither a Democrat or Republican. I don't identify with any party (hell, I don't identify with most of humanity) - I simply contribute to the political game by casting my votes for the person I think is going to do the least amount of damage....

However, I'm getting tired of people slamming Obama to me. (He's the one out of these two that I think will do less harm). Unless you have evidence that he killed puppies or babies or is some kind of psycho you're not going to change my mind and make me support McInsane. I don't normally go into politics with anyone because I see little point. However, STOP TRYING TO FORCE YOUR POLITICS UPON ME. Its not going to work - if you know me, you know that I'm terribly stubborn and have little tolerance for coercion - well, at least politically speaking ;-)

That said, I was directed to a YouTube video that I believe was intended to "open my eyes" to see the reality of the subprime mortgage problem - Obama. Yes, this video implies that the Democrats and Obama are to blame for the housing crisis.

I must admit I have been rather remiss these past couple of years - more focused upon this little world in which I dwell and all of the strange and wonderful goings on that have been occurring. I'll admit to needing to do more reading and some research but I do want to respond to this.

The video first looks at the CRA - Community Reinvestment Act of 1977. From what I have gathered in my cursory searching, the CRA was an attempt to give those of lower socio-economic standing a chance to become a homeowner. It appears that it is a government program that requires banks to lend in the lower income neighborhoods where they take deposits.

The first thing that sprang to mind when seeing the date of the CRA is that if the CRA was such a crappy program that could have caused such wide-spread damage (instituted by the crazy left) why has no one done anything about it since? I mean since 1981 (after Carters term) we have had THREE republican presidents and ONE democrat and a republican Congress for about 16 of those years?? So really, I'm sorry, all this time spent under a republican regime and they haven't done a damn thing to change it? Sorry, that just doesn't fly with me...

According to research done by Traiger and Hinckley the CRA loans were MORE responsible loans overall due to the scrutiny they underwent and more than 50% of SUBPRIME loans were made by OTHER lending institutions that were NOT subject to the CRA. And it looks like quite a bit of the good done by the CRA took place in the 90's with increased lending in lower income neighborhoods, increased homeownership, rising property values, etc.

According to Robert Gordon "the lenders subject to CRA have engaged in less, not more, of the most dangerous lending. Janet Yellen, president of the San Francisco Federal Reserve, offers the killer statistic: Independent mortgage companies, which are not covered by CRA, made high-priced loans at more than twice the rate of the banks and thrifts."

And University of Michigan Law Professor Michael Barr, a specialist in banking and finance law, flatly rejected claims that the CRA was "a significant factor in the current crisis. CRA was enacted more than 30 years ago. It would be quite odd if this 30-year old law suddenly caused an explosion in bad subprime loans from 2002-2007."

This is to be continued soon. This was only one point the video made.

My sources, in no particular order (may or may not be listed above too):

http://www.prospect.org/cs/articles?article=did_liberals_cause_the_subprime_crisis

http://www.newamerica.net/blog/asset-building/2008/its-still-not-cra-7222


http://www.crahandbook.com/preface.htm

http://delong.typepad.com/sdj/2008/09/the-cra-and-the.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Community_Reinvestment_Act

http://www.businessweek.com/investing/insights/blog/archives/2008/09/community_reinv.html?campaign_id=rss_blog_blogspotting


http://www.traigerlaw.com/publications/traiger_hinckley_llp_cra_foreclosure_study_1-7-08.pdf

http://iowadefense.wordpress.com/2008/09/27/burning-down-the-housewhat-caused-our-economic-crisis/

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/thepresidentandcabinet/a/radio010706.htm

Iron....

Mmmmm...metal...

My love of Google has met with my fear for privacy....While I've been loving cruising the net with my shiny new browser I've also been learning more about the not so GooglyGoodness of Chrome's privacy issues. There is something kinda Big Brotherish about the Omnibox (Chrome's address bar) as it sends back the keystrokes you type - EVEN if you DON'T hit send...Hmmmm....This triggers some of my massive conspiracy fears which clashes with my devotion to Google....

There are ways to prevent the data from going anywhere - apparently if you turn off suggestions and/or don't use Google as your search (yeah, right, like that's going to happen) then the information is not sent. And supposedly the Incognito setting will also prevent the dissemination of your information.

But if that is not enough there is another route to go - Iron. Its a version of Chrome without submitting your user information. Among Iron's features are no Google updater and no crash information is sent to Google. I personally have not tried it yet - I'm still weighing my options (how much to I really care that people know I'm searching for Vin Diesel pictures?)....Get Iron by visiting: http://www.srware.net/software_srware_iron_download.php

Election Fraud Will Bring Victory - PF 023