Waking Badger » politics

New Credit Card Rules Coming?

bill — Wed, 20 May 2009 12:15:05 +0000

The Senate has now passed credit reforms that are similar to what the house passed in April. Hopefully, now the bill will go to conference and then upon passage, on to Obama for signature. The bill doesn’t do everything I want, but many of the points seem to be good common sense first steps in fixing the consumer credit industries practices. Consumer Reports Money blog runs down the main points, but the main points attempt to insure interest rates are applied in a fair way and that consumers receive adequate notification. One big point in my opinion is no over the limit fees unless notified and accepted first (purchase can be declined rather than receiving the fine).

We’ll have to wait to see what comes from a combined bill to see if it gets neutered any further…

Palin decends on Twitter

bill — Thu, 14 May 2009 14:50:51 +0000

I don’t know how I missed it, but Sarah Palin started tweeting under the account, AKGovSarahPalin, on April 29th. I have no idea if it is actually her or not and I have NO intention of following her, but I thought it was a topic to mention. Remember, if you want the same brilliant nuggets of genius she gave during the campaign, then please by all means head over and click the follow button. Personally, I think you’d be better off following Ashton Kutcher and believe me, that is a scary thought

Obama's potty mouth (but, only kinda, sorta…)

bill — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 03:05:14 +0000

Oh…I just have to say that you need to go check out this blog post by April Winchell. I’ve never read her blog before, but I was pointed there as she has collected some audio clips from President Obama’s Dreams From My Father audiobook. They are simply the President speaking as someone he knows, but there is a large amount of cursing involved that you normally don’t hear in public from most levels of politicians.

Now, before someone gets the wrong idea, I see NOTHING wrong with this. It’s hilarious, it’s atypical, and it’s perfect. The President is not a saint and as such is like many of us behinds the scenes and off camera. Also, this is his relaying of a childhood friend’s comments (according to the blog). However, it’s is just great to have an audioclip of the sitting President saying, “This shit’s getting way too complicated for me”, “Sure, you can have my number baby!”, or three other choice phrases

Enjoy!

Tim Berners-Lee explains Net Neutrality

bill — Sun, 08 Feb 2009 04:37:55 +0000

Patrick Norton mentioned on Twitter that Tim Berners-Lee clarified Net Neutrality. He does sum it up into something even one of our “gifted” lawmakers should be able to understand.

Why, oh why, do people who probably have a hard time setting the time on their microwave (notice I didn’t say VCR as no one has one anymore ) get to decide how technology should be used/regulated to any extent. Yes, I do throw politicians, corporate executives, and others roaming the halls of power without a hall pass on this list!

Analog to Digital quagmire

bill — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 02:06:20 +0000

So, now the House & Senate have approved delaying the digital transition by moving the date from February 17th to June 12th. This is a horrible move that will only add to confusion.

The government is treating this as if watching TV is a right. It isn’t. Be prepared or lose the option of watching television. People unwilling/unable to convert will either do so or will find other things to fill the void (Oh my God, they might … read a bo0k!)
Each station can now switch any time between Feb. 17 and June 12 which will only add to confusion.
The minority of people who haven’t gotten converter boxes will likely continue on as this group either doesn’t understand, doesn’t care, or is likely to procrastinate around the new date.
The minority of people that they are worried about were only recently getting used to the looming date. Now, they will either become confused on the actual date or simply ignore it assuming it will be delayed again. After all, the government has not stuck to it’s plans and in turn has shown the public it is ill prepared to do so in June.
Other uses of the freed analog bandwidth are being delayed unnescessarily.
This switch will be painful for some no matter when you do it. JUST DO IT! This is a band-aid the nation must rip off in one swift motion.

President-Elect Obama!

bill — Wed, 05 Nov 2008 06:19:33 +0000

Well, I think I will end my night of election watching. Obama has won…thus far without my state’s help, but so be it (come on NC, get those last few counties in!). I have to say that both the concession and acceptance speeches were excellent and well presented. McCain redeemed himself somewhat in my eyes by doing exactly what he should have for the good of the country and Obama showed us an even more presidential side with his Grant Park speech. I’m looking forward to the day he is sworn in and I have hope for what can be done in this country. Now in closing, here are some things I hope can be taken on:

Properly fix the economic issues and ensure this horrid bailout achieves some good result (if possible)
Get us out of Iraq (to the extent possible)
Properly work to rebuild/rewin Afghanistan
Curtail the corporate welfare that seems to know no bounds
Fix the copyright system and return it to its roots of ensuring the public good while protecting innovation
Fix our global reputation
Repeal/Rewrite the DMCA
Ensure net neutrality
Twitter from the oval office
I’m sure there are more…

Good night and just think, we should pretty much be done with campaign ads

I sure hope that when I wake up, the final states will be complete in the presidential election and that California’s prop 8 will have gone down in defeat!

Mmmmm…sleep and dreams of no more political ads

bill — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 04:23:37 +0000

Well, I think it is time to hit the sack for the evening as I’ve watched some news, Daily Show/Colbert Reports, played a bit of WoW (new alt ding’d 10 tonight), and of course wasted an hour or so cruising the interwebs (no, that’s not right…tubes…just for you soon to be ex-Senator Ted). Tomorrow is likely to be an interesting day, but at the very least this damn election is about to end

I hope by the end of tomorrow, we’ll be toasting Obama’s election, but I won’t assume anything at this point.

Night all and make sure to vote if you haven’t already…well, unless you support McCain and then you have my permission to stay home all day tomorrow and go nowhere near a voting booth

Vote, Vote, Vote!

bill — Sat, 01 Nov 2008 03:23:52 +0000

If you have early voting going on in your state and you haven’t yet voted get out the vote. obama. Remember that it is extremely important to exercise your civic duty. obama. Please don’t believe that the election is going to be a landslide. Every vote will count. obama. Enjoy your night and I will be back with some Halloween videos later. obama.

obama. Check out this cool Electoral calculator. obama.

Have fun and vote! See you later…

David Sedaris takes on the undecided voter

bill — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 02:18:57 +0000

I found this at John Gruber’s Daring Fireball and I think David Sedaris makes an excellent comparison. I’m not normally a big Sedaris fan, but I did think this take on undecided voters in this election year was right on the money!

To put them in perspective, I think of being on an airplane. The flight attendant comes down the aisle with her food cart and, eventually, parks it beside my seat. “Can I interest you in the chicken?” she asks. “Or would you prefer the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it?”

To be undecided in this election is to pause for a moment and then ask how the chicken is cooked.

Just to be clear, I used to be very fond of McCain if not an out and out supporter. However, his decisions and behavior in this election show me that he has no strongly held beliefs that cannot be thrown out the window in an effort to amass power and position. Sarah Palin as VP is a joke and her place on the tickets shows that his “maverick” nature is simply reckless ill-informed choices without thought to the consequences. Honestly, I’m just as frustrated with the Republican party as with McCain and I think they need a good thrashing to maybe learn that this country is not God, Guns and hating/mistrusting those different than you. America is a melting pot; pure and simple. We have all sorts of people and ideologies within our borders and I hope this election shows that inclusion trumps fear, uncertainty, and doubt.

Who do you plan to vote for in the upcoming election?

bill — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 01:09:59 +0000

Testing out the new polling feature…

[polldaddy poll=1000813]

UPDATE: Poll disabled as I’m not with WordPress.com anymore