Word Bending

While listening to some old Toad the Wet Sprocket music this yesterday morning, I heard this line from "Nanci": "I can't believe you - you bend your words like Uri Geller's spoons"

This got me thinking about the new Recovery.gov website. At the bottom left of the main page, we see this chart:

This leads many to believe that this colossal spending bill is around 1/3 "tax relief". Actually, we should all take a look at this a little differently. First of all, here's a pie graph representation of the bill using The Administration's numbers from above:

Yes, that's a huge slice of pie that's tax relief! But if you dig deeper into the site and go to the "Where Is Your Money Going?" page, we can see that 42% of the "tax relief" dollars are actually tax breaks allocated for some of the other parts of the pie. What happens if we re-allocate those "tax relief" dollars over into the separate sections? We see this:

As you can see, it's much more evenly distributed. But without the words (and numbers) having been bent like the spoon above, the public perception of the bill may be drastically shifted. Certainly we're still seeing a big chunk as pure "tax relief" [that I understand much of which will be allocated to taxpayers who should be seeing around $13 per week "extra" on our checks ($400/year single, $800/year couple)]. I won't go into the arguments for or against that here. But one of the other things about the "tax relief" is that $61,000,000,000.00 (yes, Billion) will be going to "Protecting the Vulnerable" (defined here as "low-income and vulnerable households"). This is in addition to the other $81 Billion dedicated to this group. Am I saying that we as people should not be helping out those less fortunate? Far from it! But, monetarily speaking, we should not be calling part of this "tax relief" because many of those people do not even pay taxes. It is estimated that $264 Billion of this spending bill will be welfare spending in some form or another. Sadly, this will be undoing a lot of what President Clinton changed in regards to welfare. (Did I just say it was sad to undo something President Clinton did?!?)

You may not agree that President Obama is bending spoons with his rhetoric, but it is pretty plain to see that he wants people to believe that this is one big "tax relief" +spending bill. I hope you do not get pulled into thinking that or that Republicans should just be onboard with it because it has tax cuts. A tax cut does not a conservative make... (nor does being a Republican mean one is a conservative).

Here's a nice quote from the "Tooth Fairy Economics" article:

"We should not want to "stimulate" an economy based on debt and
overconsumption back into existence. We should want to restructure it
along sustainable lines."

Think about that. Our leaders really do think that this version of our economy is what needs to be revived. It's not! We do need to seriously reconsider what we're doing. For one, the FairTax is a good start as I've said before. A bad idea is spending another $275 Billion to help with mortgages. Even if this bill passes, I've heard estimates that even 40% of those affected won't even be able to pay their mortgages if the interest rates are reduced to 2% on their loans. That estimate can be heard in this video.

Free Christmas Music!

Over at Amazon, they are doing 25 Days of Free - a free Christmas MP3 download every day in December through Christmas day.

Also, hat tip to Greg for letting me know this! There are also a couple of free Brian Setzer Christmas tracks there: Angels We Have Heard on High and Take a Break Guys.

Happy Downloading...

Bailing Out Local Governments?

So there are now many big cities seeking bailouts from the federal government. Atlanta is one of these cities - right down the road from me. Yesterday, in his Nuze, Neal Boortz outlined a plan for how Atlanta should make some changes that would prevent them from having to worry about some of the economic problems. Many of those things can be generalized and implemented by other local governments instead of them asking for federal assistance or raising taxes.

Here is a summary:
- Sell off some land for development
- Privatize some things like garbage collection and the servicing of fleet vehicles
- Trim spending in other areas
- Specifically for Atlanta, the airport should be privatized - good details on this above

This is very important that we start with reduction in local government spending and try to get that to "trickle up". We have way too many unsustainable entitlement programs already in our Federal government, and I'm shocked that doesn't bother some people.

Apple Folks, help!

OK, iPhone support website is HORRIBLE!!

First of all, the choice of only 5 "descriptions" of the problem is really poor - none allow for an actual problem with the device, only for accessories. I guess I'll be calling them later. Here's the issue I'm having - can anyone help? This is on an original iPhone 8GB that I've had almost a year, so it's still under warranty... :)

Yesterday, I started getting this error message when synching my iPhone: "this iPhone cannot be synched. The file or directory is corrupted and unreadable." I decided to restore from a backup but I continued to get the error. After working with this some more last night, I have found that I ONLY get that error when I try to sync my Photos. This sounds to me like there is some type of corruption on the flash drive. Also, when I try to sync my Google Contacts, the sync never completes or times out - it's been doing "Syncing contacts with 'Chris' iPhone'" for 30 minutes now. Whereas prior to yesterday my syncs would only take a couple of minutes at the most. I am running firmware version 2.1 and have been since the day it was released and I have only installed a handful of apps (which all sync fine). I've never had any problems with this great device, but now it appears that the drive is corrupt! Online searches don't help me out too much, either.

Georgians: Remember to VOTE on December 2!

There are many pundits on both sides of the aisle watching Georgia's Senate runoff between Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss and Democrat challenger Jim Martin very closely. If you live in Georgia, like I do, then you need to make sure that you vote on or by December 2. Advance Voting will start on November 24. This site should hopefully have information soon on where you can vote early. If you need an absentee ballot, you can follow instructions here.

As we currently stand, the Democrats may have 59 seats in the US Senate. This is because the Alaskan and Minnesotan are extremely close and are in recount phases. Some of you may be thinking that 60 Democrat Senators is exactly what this country needs. Senator Clinton believes that this is needed to bring about a certain change and I've seen a quote from President-Elect Obama from several years back stating that the only way to bring about the sweeping change that he feels is needed is with a Democrat President and a supermajority in the Congress.

But I know I'm not the only one who doesn't think this is a great idea - whether it's a Republican or Democrat supermajority. I also know others who have said they don't think it's the best idea to have a single party running both branches - much less a blank check. I know that the House is still not a "supermajority" but it doesn't matter since they don't have filibuster privileges. Dick Morris also has a good column on this.

But really, no matter how you vote, make sure that you make your voice known again on December 2. Perhaps by then we will know if this is truly a case for preventing a supermajority, but you should still vote.

As a side note, I'm really tired of the misleading ads that Jim Martin is running regarding Saxby Chambliss' support of the FairTax. I've written about the FairTax plan here in the past. If you are not familiar with it, I urge you to look into it and give it some thought.

5 Years Ago

Our wonderful daughter was born!! I can't believe that it's been 5 years... She's growing up way too fast too.

Happy Birthday Emma Grace!!!!

Then

Now

ESV Study Bible Out This Week

The ESV Study Bible is now available for purchase online. It hit the stores on Wednesday, but you can pre-order it from the link above. I've been using this translation since it was first published in 2001. It's very readable, literal, and has taken advantage of many of the advances that the translators of the KJV desired to see so that their work of improvement on previous English translations would be still further improved. You can read from this version here.

Go check out this Study Bible - there are tons of resources available in it (check out the Blog section of the Study Bible site for many of these). I plan on getting one soon (probably for Christmas). Along with the resources available in the Bible, everything will also be available online at no additional cost if you own a copy of the Study Bible. Here is a video demonstrating some of the features:

7

Around this exact time of day 7 years ago I was sitting at work when my mom called to tell me that a plane just crashed into the World Trade Center. I thought she was crazy until I turned on Fox News in our server room and got my colleagues in there watching. Then hearing reports that the Pentagon was hit. Then the second plane hit the other tower and a plane crashed in Pennsylvania. Then the towers fell... It was really surreal and words can't describe it. Last year, I took the picture below. It's a shot of two flags standing at the site of the World Trade Center with a plane flying just overhead...



And here was a shot of the construction that's happening at Ground Zero:


It was really odd to see this site nearly 6 years later. I wish they had it a little more open - there was a wrap around the fencing and you could only find gaps to look through.

For the past few years I've posted the lyrics to Dream Theater's Sacrificed Sons about 9/11. It's a pretty powerful song. You can find those lyrics here.

And here is a video of them playing the song live in Rome.

A Courageous Story

One of the few podcasts I listen to is Albert Mohler's, and he has a great blog too. Way back on May 6, 2008, he posted a blog titled Welcome to the World, Trig Paxson Van Palin about Governor Sarah Palin's pregnancy and the birth of her son with Down's Syndrome. I urge you to go read it and the AP article to which it links.

She loves her baby boy and is proud of him. "I'm looking at him right now, and I see perfection," Palin told the Associated Press. "Yeah, he has an extra chromosome. I keep thinking, in our world, what is normal and what is perfect?"

Trig Paxson Van Palin has an extra chromosome, two proud and loving parents, four very happy siblings, and he will bring his own joy to untold numbers of lives.

He will face some unique challenges, but he has a loving family who will face those with him. They will learn together the wonder and beauty of a Down syndrome child and will learn to see the glory of God in his trusting face.

Mothers Day 2008 is certain to be a special day in the Alaska Governor's Mansion. What an unspeakable tragedy that so many other homes will have aborted that joy.

Anti-Obamanomics

Just reading a good article at Mises.org titled: Anti-Obamanomics: Why Everyone Should Be in Favor of Reducing Taxes on the "Rich" Generally, the economists at the site don't post about particular candidates. But with so much focus on the election now, I urge you to go read some from it. It's actually a response to an article in the New York Times Magazine:

Are the American people being primed to elect as President of the United States a home-grown version of Hugo Chavez, in the person of Barack Obama? This is a question one can come away with after reading "Obamanomics," the featured article in this last Sunday's (August 24, 2008) New York Times Magazine. Written by Times' columnist David Leonhardt, the article provides insight into Obama's thinking on economics and the economic policies he would be likely to pursue if he were elected President.

Some of the highlights are as follows:

Two major impediments make it difficult for people to recognize the fact that everyone would benefit from reductions, or, better still, the total abolition of all of these taxes on the so-called rich — made possible, of course, by equivalent reductions in government spending. The first is simply massive ignorance of economics, especially of the general benefit from private ownership of the means of production. People have not grasped the profound insight of Mises that, in a market economy, in order benefit from privately owned means of production, one does not have to be an owner of the means of production. This is because one benefits from other people's means of production — every time one buys the products of those means of production.

I think I know a lot of extremely smart people who say they just don't "get" economics. I don't "get" a lot of things (like chemistry or physics), so that's understandable. But when we're talking about massive redistribution of wealth, this affects us all, so people should try to comprehend economics. And to pre-empt the comment that the Republicans are the ones who have allowed spending to get out of hand - I cede that point. I don't agree with that, but I'm a Conservative and not a Republican. There is a difference! Further, and with more pre-emption in mind, take a look at Senator Obama's acceptance speech. I was going to go through and count the new programs he's wanting to instate that "the government" will pay for, but could not stomach reading past the first few paragraphs of partisan politics and pandering. But you can go here or here for more information on how he's misleading us and how he will increase spending as well. Until Congress decides to buckle down, we'll have to keep raising taxes to pay for the pork.

The redistribution of wealth is allegedly necessary to enable an individual who does not own the wealth presently owned by others to benefit from that wealth. Only as and when their property passes to him can he benefit from it, the redistributors believe. This is the kind of "largesse" Obama intends to practice. It is taking funds from those most prodigious at accumulating capital, capital that would benefit all, and then giving the funds to others to consume. Meeting the needs of the poor with the consumption of capital is Obama's formula for prosperity.

Small business owners will have a hard time growing their businesses when their capital is further taxed. Less growth also means less new jobs. And further, increased taxes on businesses will likely lead to increased cost of goods - which leads to increased prices at the counter. So while the personal income taxes may be less for a person, how much will that be offset by the increased costs incurred because the manufacturers of goods and services now have higher costs?

Starting with tax cuts for the so-called rich — based on equivalent reductions in government spending — is the only hope for the resumption of significant economic progress, indeed, for the avoidance of economic retrogression and growing impoverishment. Because of this, it is actually the quickest and surest road to any major reduction in the tax burden of the average wage earner. It holds out the prospect of the average wage earner being able to double his standard of living in a generation or less. The average standard of living would double in a single generation if economic progress at a rate of just 3 percent a year could be achieved. Such economic progress would also mean a halving of the average wage earner's tax burden in the same period of time — if government spending per capita in real terms were held fixed, for then he would have double the real income out of which to pay his present level of taxes. And then, of course, once all the taxes that most stood in the way of capital accumulation and economic progress were eliminated, further reductions in government spending and taxation could and should take place that would be of corresponding direct benefit to wage earners, that is, show up in the reduction of the taxes paid by them.

This analysis makes clear that an essential flaw of so-called supply-side economics — the policy both of the Reagan administration and of the present Bush administration — was the failure to face up to the need to reduce government spending. While the policy of reducing taxes by both administrations was perfectly correct, most of the potential benefit of the tax cuts was lost through the corresponding enlargement of federal budget deficits. Regrettably, both administrations and their supporters lacked the courage required to abolish government spending programs to make those tax cuts possible without deficits.

Their failure to have done so explains why the great mass of the American people have not benefitted from the tax cuts as they should have. The explanation is that, absent equivalent reductions in government spending, the tax cuts did not translate into increases in capital formation, but the opposite. Instead of there being more demand by business for labor and capital goods, there was less; instead of more rapid economic progress and rising real wages, there has been economic stagnation or outright decline, along with stagnant or falling real wages.

Of course, in a further display of their ignorance and blindness, members of the Left will undoubtedly characterize the line of argument I've presented in this article as the "trickle-down theory." There is nothing trickle-down about it. There is only the fact that capital accumulation and economic progress depend on saving and innovation and that these in turn depend on the freedom to make high profits and accumulate great wealth. The only alternative to improvement for all, through economic progress achieved in this way, is the futile attempt of some men to gain at the expense of others by means of looting and plundering. This, the loot-and-plunder theory, is the alternative advocated by the redistributionist critics of the misnamed trickle-down theory. The loot-and-plunder theory is the theory of Obama, of the Democratic Party, and of much of the Republican Party. It is time to supplant it with the sound economic theory developed by generations of intellectual giants ranging from Smith and Ricardo to Böhm-Bawerk and Mises.

Great points from Dick Morris

I find it rather humorous that the DNC is still thinking they have to run against George W. Bush. A little reality check - he's not in the race! Here's a great article from Dick Morris:

A STRATEGIC OPENING FOR MCCAIN

The truth is, of course, that McCain is the most unlike Bush of any of the Republican senator. (When Obama’s people claim that Bush and McCain voted the same 94 percent of the time, they forget that most of the votes in the Senate are unanimous.) The fact that McCain backs commending a basketball team on its victory doesn’t mean that he is in lockstep ideologically with the president.

The issues on which McCain and Bush differ are legion:

* McCain fought for campaign finance reform — McCain-Feingold — that Bush resisted and ultimately signed because he had no choice.

* McCain led the battle to restrict interrogation techniques of terror suspects and to ban torture.

* McCain went with Joe Lieberman on a tough measure to curb climate change, something Bush denies is going on.

* McCain opposed the Bush tax cuts when they passed.

* McCain urged the Iraq surge, a posture Bush rejected for years before conceding its wisdom.

* McCain favors FDA regulation of tobacco and sponsored legislation to that effect, a position all but a handful of Republican senators oppose.

* McCain’s energy bill, also with Lieberman, is a virtual blueprint for energy independence and development of alternate sources.

* After the Enron scandal, McCain introduced sweeping reforms in corporate governance and legislation to guarantee pensions and prohibit golden parachutes for executives. Bush opposed McCain’s changes and the watered-down Sarbanes-Oxley bill eventuated.

* McCain has been harshly critical of congressional overspending, particularly of budgetary earmarks, a position Bush only lately adopted (after the Democrats took over Congress).

Remember that McCain ran against Bush in 2000.

McCain’s Republican advisers need to realize that they won the primary and that they do not need to cotton to the delegates at their convention or to appease the Bush White House. The more they respond to Obama’s and Biden’s attacks on Bush by saying, “It ain’t me, babe,” the more he will moot the entire purpose of the Democratic convention.

It is a rare opportunity to nullify the entire Democratic line of attack, and McCain should seize on it.

Lincoln Brewster featured in the Line 6 Newsletter

This was cool - the most recent Line 6 newsletter has a "recommended" section in which they have this:

Lincoln Brewster discusses his live rig and the great gear responsible for creating his sought-after sounds.

Here they link to a YouTube clip where Lincoln discusses the gear he uses live. This was random to see Lincoln, who is a great worship leader and guitarist, featured in this. We have done a good bit of his music at church. The reason he is featured is because of the Line 6 PodX3 Live that he uses (I have the XT Live). He also discusses the '57 reissue Fender Strats he uses (like those hon??) :P.

But there's more - while looking at the video, I saw a link on the right to Lincoln playing a Journey song. So, being the child of the 80's that I am, I had to click that. Turns out that Lincoln used to play for Steve Perry - how crazy is that!

Here's the clip of Lincoln's rig:


Here's the Journey clip:

What's Your Blog Reading Level?

Happy Anniversary Honey!

Just want to wish my wife a Happy 8th Anniversary today!! I love you! I can't believe we have been married 8 years now and have been together for nearly 11!

Here we are just the other day - our big, happy family (except for OT who was being held captive by EG!)

Senator Obama Makes Paris Hilton Look Like a Recluse

Sounds like something that the vast right-wing conspiracy would be accused of saying through a new John McCain ad. And to make the point that there is a wild media frenzy surrounding Obama, the McCain camp did release an ad touting that Obama is "the biggest celebrity in the world" complete with a passing picture of Paris Hilton.

However, the title of this blog post isn't something that McCain is saying to undermine Obama. Here's the full quote:

"Andy Warhol said we all get our 15 minutes of fame," ... "I've already had an hour and a half. I mean, I'm so overexposed, I'm making Paris Hilton look like a recluse."

Yes, you read that correctly, that was something that Barack Obama said about himself!! Even he had to admit (back in 2005 - even before the hype surrounding him has escalated to where it is today!!) that he was getting so much "fame" (a synonym of which is "celebrity") that it appeared to be more coverage than one of the "top" celebrities at that time.

I love irony... ;)

Arctic Ocean Getting Warm; Seals Vanish and Icebergs Melt.

great masses of ice have now been replaced by moraines of earth and stones

at many points well-known glaciers have entirely disappeared

Quotes from Sunday's NY Times?

Negative. The blog post's title is the headline and the above quotes are direct from a November 2, 1922 Washington Post article!

Tiger Woods has met his match

Saw this commercial on tv the other night...

Great Ronald Reagan Quotes

'Here's my strategy on the Cold War: We win, they lose.'

'The most terrifying words in the English language are: I'm from the government and I'm here to help.'

'The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.'

'Of the four wars in my lifetime, none came about because the U.S. Was too strong.'

'I have wondered at times about what the Ten Commandments would have looked like if Moses had run them through the U.S. Congress.'

'The taxpayer: That's someone who works for the federal government but doesn't have to take the civil service examination.'

'Government is like a baby: An alimentary canal with a big appetite at one end and no sense of responsibility at the other.'

'The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.'

'It has been said that politics is the second oldest profession. I have learned that it bears a striking resemblance to the first.'

'Government's view of the economy could be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.'

'Politics is not a bad profession. If you succeed, there are many rewards; if you disgrace yourself, you can always write a book.'

'No arsenal, or no weapon in the arsenals of the world, is as formidable as the will and moral courage of free men and women.'

Taken from: http://boortz.com/more/reagan_quotes.html

Whew...

Senate Blocks "Windfall Profits" Tax

This morning, a cloture vote on the Democrats' scheme to impose a "windfall profits tax" on America's oil companies failed on a 50-44 vote. The bill would have imposed a 25% surtax on any "unreasonable" profits being earned by the oil companies, among other provisions. The roll call is here. Several of the usual suspects--Corker, Smith and Snowe--voted with the Democrats. Every Democrat who was present voted in favor of the measure, but four Democrats, including Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, didn't show up; John McCain was absent as well.

I've posted about this in the past here and Greg has a good post on it here.

$4 Gas

First of all, it's not good for me to actually have time to post on this blog, and now I've been challenged to post some things... ;)

While we're talking politics here, someone asked in a previous thread why I focused on something so minor. First of all, lately I haven't focused on much of anything here! But let's talk about "$4+/gallon gas" here for now.

For my part in this, I recently traded a gas-guzzling, supercharged, 93 octane drinking car that I really liked for a much more economical compact car (30mpg city now versus 18). So, I guess you could say I'm doing my part in reducing how much gas I'm using. (As an aside, Daimler-Chrysler should focus on fuel economy and not $2.99/gallon gas guarantees...)

But the blame on $4/gallon gas can't be laid squarely on the shoulders of those in the Executive Branch. We now have a problem with an ineffective Legislative Branch with empty promises. My pal Greg just posted a timely post regarding this yesterday. Let's look at what Greg wrote there:

April 24, 2006, [Nancy Pelosi] released another [statement about a gas plan]:

“Democrats have a commonsense plan to help bring down skyrocketing gas prices by cracking down on price gouging, rolling back the billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies, tax breaks and royalty relief given to big oil and gas companies, and increasing production of alternative fuels.”

Let me get this straight, according to Nancy Pelosi, the Democrats had a plan in April of 2006 to lower gas prices if they became the majority. Well, in November of 2006, the Democrat party came into the majority position.

As of this writing, it has been 779 days since Nancy Pelosi pledged to lower prices at the pump.

Greg, you're right. The Democrats ran on this platform back then and they're running with this as part of the platform again. And to address the comment ahead of time, it will be pointed out that if they did introduce legislation that President Bush would just veto it. Well they should have at least tried it. I'm really open to comments on some of the bills that were introduced. The Democrats control both Houses, so they obviously could have forced some legislation through. If any of you are aware of them, please let me know. But you can also feel free to see the list of vetoes that President Bush has made. There's even a veto that the Senate overrode back in 2007 after the Democrats had control, so that argument really doesn't hold water.

While there are a lot of people who place the blame for high prices on the War in Iraq or just poor policies by the President, what if a lot of what we're seeing is just Capitalism (gone awry)? What if those who pump the crude oil have decided that it would be a great time to hike the prices and have the perfect scapegoat in the Bush Administration? It's just a theory of mine. Some people have conspiracy theories about the Administration, and I have mine... ;)

By the way, here are a couple of good articles by economists regarding recent pricing.

"What Are Just Prices?"

We all have strange and contradictory wishes concerning what prices should be. We are outraged at what is happening to the price of gas and food. We don't think they should go up. In real terms, we want them to fall, and they have fallen in the last decade and a half. That's a good thing, right? That's how the world should work.

But housing? Now, that's a different matter. When the prices fall, people freak out. It's like the end of the world. How is it possible that my own home would fall in price?! That's not the way the world should work. Everyone knows that house prices are suppose to go up up up, all the time, without fail, until the end of time.

"The Oil-Price Bubble"

We suggest that there is a high likelihood that the massive increase in the price of oil is the manifestation of a severe misallocation of resources. The loose monetary policy of the Fed from January 2001 to June 2004 is the likely key factor behind this misallocation. (The federal funds rate was lowered from 6% to 1%.) The tighter Fed stance from June 2004 to September 2007 should undermine the existence of various nonproductive activities and in turn reduce upward pressures on the price of oil.

Regrettably, the loose monetary stance that the Fed has adopted since September of last year, coupled with still very buoyant Chinese economic activity, is likely to counter any downward pressure on the price of oil. The Fed's current policy of fighting an emerging economic slump is, in fact, a policy of deepening the misallocation of resources, thereby promoting higher prices for oil. If our thesis regarding the oil market bubble is valid, then it is the Fed's policies that must be blamed for the erosion in consumers' living standards and not the rising price of oil.

UPDATE This is the best Democrats can do?

This is the plaque commemorating fallen police officers in Portland, Oregon

This is the entire memorial site

This is a disgrace!!!
When (less than one term) Senator Obama had his huge 75,000 person rally in Oregon, this is where someone decided to place the port-a-potties?!? What in the world were they thinking? This is truly sad.

Update: Apparently Senator Obama hasapologized for this incident and his campaign claims that they had nothing to do with it. However, everyone should be offended that someone thought it was a good idea to do this. The first I heard about this incident was yesterday, so thanks for the update Brian...

By the way, here is some good commentary on Obama's "acceptance speech" recently.

Maybe he should wrap up his tour of the States. I guess he has visited 58 of them so far...

Great Quote!

While reading God in the Dock: The Apologetics of C.S. Lewis by Roger Nicole, I stumbled on a wonderful quote by C.S. Lewis from The Screwtape Letters

"It does not matter how small the sins are, provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and into the Nothing. Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick. Indeed, the safest road to Hell is the gradual one" (p. 56).

Wow, that is so true. Sometimes we think about the "big sins". Like the "Seven Deadly Sins" or the list of sins we see the Lord hates from Proverbs 6:16–19, etc... But Lewis tells us that if even the small things in our lives are dragging us from the Light of Christ that the net effect may be the same on our souls. I do not believe I have The Screwtape Letters, I should probably pick it up sometime...

My Guitar Hero Rig...

Yep, here is what my guitar hero rig looks like... :) But it probably cost a lot more than a game, right Jen?

Just another reason to take a pic of Blondie! By the way, I just picked up the Line 6 PodXT Live in the picture. Got a great deal on it on eBay. I should have bought it a few years ago, but my Korg AX1500G was sufficient. I have always been impressed with the Line 6 stuff, so I finally broke down and got one.

Let me know if you still think it was a hoax

This one's for all of the conspiracy theorists out there. At the link, you can watch videos of this test performed in 1988, but here are the results.



And just to make sure I'm clear - there are many who still believe that the plane that crashed into the Pentagon on 9/11 wasn't a plane at all. This is because they cite that there wasn't any debris left. Well, these videos and tests from 1988 prove that if a plane crashes into a concrete object that no debris will be left. So if for some reason you still don't believe it was a plane, then there's nothing else I can say to you...

Here's some info from the Sandia National Labs site:

The purpose of the test was to determine the impact force, versus time, due to the impact, of a complete F-4 Phantom — including both engines — onto a massive, essentially rigid reinforced concrete target (3.66 meters thick). Previous tests used F-4 engines at similar speeds. The test was not intended to demonstrate the performance (survivability) of any particular type of concrete structure to aircraft impact. The impact occurred at the nominal velocity of 215 meters per second (about 480 mph). The mass of the jet fuel was simulated by water; the effects of fire following such a collision was not a part of the test. The test established that the major impact force was from the engines. The test was performed by Sandia National Laboratories under terms of a contract with the Muto Institute of Structural Mechanics, Inc., of Tokyo.

Some updates

Yes, I've been a slack blogger - both here and at BleedYellow... For those who really want to know what happens in the Nut House, you can keep up with my wife's blog - there are some great pics of the family this weekend!! She does much better at keeping everyone up to speed. It's been a little busy lately, and we do appreciate all of the thoughts and prayers for Jen's mom. We're all taking it a day at a time now with her on chemo. She has some ups and downs, but we're grateful and thankful that this weekend was one of ups.

Oh, here's one of me and the kiddos:

The Imagination of C.S. Lewis

There is a great article over at the Ligonier Ministries blog by Leland Ryken titled The Imagination of C.S. Lewis. This article explores how the stories came about for Lewis and how they took on their Christian meaning. It's quite amazing actually:

Lewis famously said that "all my seven Narnian books...began with pictures in my head. At first they were not a story, just pictures." Thus The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe "began with a picture of Faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood." Just as we are recovering from the shock of that revelation, Lewis adds, "This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself: 'Let's try to make a story about it.'"

Just in case we might think that we cannot possibly have heard things correctly, Lewis also gave us another passage of similar import -- only more shocking. In countering the assumption of some of his readers that he "began by asking myself how I could say something about Christianity to children," Lewis claimed that "at first there wasn't even anything Christian about [the stories]."

The order of composition suggests an order of reading. If we follow the lead of Lewis himself, a major lesson we can learn from the Narnian stories is that they are first of all stories -- adventure stories, fantasy stories, children's stories. These narrative features are not simply "a disguise for something more 'adult'."

There is an image posted at the article that details the Biblical themes of the stories - basically they are a walk through the Biblical narrative:

Congress - the real April Fool's joke

I saw this story that Congress is up in arms again over how much those evil oil companies are raking in. I'm pretty tired of hearing it - especially when the government makes more money off of the oil companies than the companies themselves. Yep, they take more from Big Oil in taxes than what those scoundrels are left with.

Anyway, the story linked to above had a funny line from an Exxon exec:

Alluding to the fact that Congress often doesn't rate very high in opinion polls, Cleaver told the executives: "Your approval rating is lower than ours, and that means you're down low."

The following is a repost from November of 2005.

One thing that is becoming popular of late is wanting to force an earnings cap on private companies. It's under the guise of helping Americans because the "official" target is "Big Oil." Yesterday, I heard Rush Limbaugh give a statistic that "Big Oil" earns 10 cents on every gallon of gas sold and that "Big Government" earns 45 cents. I thought this was really strange and that Big Oil had to make more than this, but I didn't feel like researching it. Well, this morning I noticed The real windfall in my Bloglines from the Mises Institute (an economics website).

Last week, after Exxon Mobil (XOM) published record quarterly profits of $9.9 billion, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist called for hearings to see whether a windfall profits tax should be imposed. Checking the SEC 10-Q filing reveals the following:



Now, let's break this down.

Exxon Mobil paid $25.8 BILLION in taxes the 3rd Quarter. They were in a 41.8% tax bracket. This means that they took in about $61.7 Billion and were left with around $35.9 Billion. After their expenditures, they profited less than 17% of their total earnings.

Finally, the citizens and government officials seem to be really upset that Exxon Mobil made nearly $10 Billion in the quarter. Putting this chart to practical use, please note that the Government profited $4 Billion more in 3Q 2005 than in 3Q 2004. We have to have some accountability here. The government took in nearly three times more money ($25 Billion) than Exxon's net profits ($9.9 Billion) and they are wanting more.

Ollie's First Birthday Party Yesterday!

We had a blast with his birthday party yesterday!! Here is a Flickr Slideshow and below are a few pictures.


Ollie wasn't too into smashing his smash cake...


My Dad got to be a conductor too!


Big Sis had a blue tongue!


Here were the awesome cakes!


Jen and Ashleigh being silly...


The 3 cousins (sort of) posing for a picture!

1,975 Years Ago

He is risen!

Happy Easter

An unforgettable kiss

In remembrance of a kiss nearly 2,000 years ago...


Petra - Judas' Kiss

Happy First Birthday....

to my son OT... We love you brother... :)

Overheard at The Cleaners

"Sir, would you like the scented starch today?"



By the way, my wife pointed this out to me... :)

Please Update Your Feeds

Looking at my feedburner stats, I see that a majority of my subscribers are still only subscribed to my blogspot RSS feed.

If you've been subscribing to my feedburner feed all along (http://feeds.feedburner.com/cwhisonant), then there's nothing you'll need to do. All of my posts at BleedYellow.com and those at cwhisonant.blogspot.com will appear in that feed.

I will likely post my "Yellow"-related stuff just at BleedYellow.com. I will post personal stuff at this blog. So please stay subscribed to that feed.

If you insist on just subscribing to my BleedYellow.com blog, that feed is:
http://www.bleedyellow.com/blogs/roller-ui/rendering/feed/lotusnut/entries/atom/

Also, if you want to subscribe to all blogs here at BleedYellow.com, that feed is:
http://www.bleedyellow.com/blogs/roller-ui/rendering/feed/bloghome/entries/atom/

Are you happy Mitch?!?

You (and Mike) should be - your Giants just knocked off the Pats!! Congrats!!

Nice tunes

So cool - I've been to at least two sessions where the music playing
was Joe Satriani!! Lotusphere + Satch = :)

Happy Birthday Honey!

Please head over to my wife's blog and wish her a happy birthday!!

Love you Jen!

My New Blog

Please take a moment to check out my new blog at BleedYellow.com!!!!

Neal Morse - Official Sola Scriptura DVD Trailer

This looks like it will be good! View it here!

He also has a new album coming out!

The Twenties are behind me...

Yup, I turned 30 today. W00T! Looking forward to dinner with Jen tonight!

Countdown to Lotusphere...

Can you imagine the loss if your email becomes inaccessible even for an hour?

Devin - Welcome To Lotus 911!!!!

I would like to extend my congrats to Devin Olson and welcome him to Lotus 911. See what Devin has to say at his blog.

Sametime in an Active Directory and Exchange environment.

This is for Sametime 8.0 on Domino 8.0 pointing to AD for authentication with an Exchange server.

When trying to get the meeting notifications to work, I initially recieved this error:
Dead Failure Reason:User Sametime Development/Lotus Notes Companion Products (Sametime Development/Lotus Notes Companion Products@Domain) not listed in Domino Directory

After enabling smtpclientdebug=1, I was seeing that the error was actually similar to this: Meeting notification email to moderator

Specifically, the error is: SMTPClient: Error parsing from address

The key part of this error is that it's an error parsing from address. To make a long story short, I ended up having to open STConf.nsf in Domino Designer, then opening the the "sendnotification email" script library. In the sub used for notifications, I had to modify what was being used for the sender's address.

One note is that you should create a Sametime Admin account on the Domino server as well as on the Exchange server. In Exchange, you could create a Sametime Admin group to receive the replies if you would like. Here's what I changed to not only solve the issue above, but to also make the Outlook Client display a name in the Inbox folder.

Look for the following If loop and replace it with the following code down to the line that is: Set header = body.CreateHeader("Sender")

If (sendEmailFrom = "") Then
'sendEmailFrom = meetingDoc.STCreator(0)
sendEmailFrom = "sametime.admin@exchangedomain.com"
End If

' The following three are the best way to ensure that the client renders the
' sender's address correctly. When modifying the principal field, Domino must
' be able to resolve the address in the local directory (from my understanding and
' prior troubleshooting).
doc.From = "Sametime Admin"
doc.Principal = "Sametime Admin"
doc.replyto = "Sametime Admin"
' You can just use the internet address for the following sender fields.
doc.SendFrom = sendEmailFrom
doc.DisplaySent = sendEmailFrom
doc.AltFrom = sendEmailFrom
doc.INetFrom = sendEmailFrom
doc.tmpDisplayFrom_Preview = sendEmailFrom
doc.tmpDisplayFrom_NoLogo = sendEmailFrom
doc.tmpDisplaySentBy = sendEmailFrom

Do guitarists really play Guitar Hero?

So I was walking around BestBuy tonight and decided to test drive one of the guitar hero games. I just don't get it. Maybe it's because I'm a guitarist? I played Black Hole Sun (on Rock Band) on medium and got boo'd off the stage rather quickly. I guess if I have spare time to play an instrument I'll just pick up one of my guitars... ;)

Randomness...

While I was in BestBuy, I picked up a Dynex headphone adapter for my iPhone and a somewhat decent set of earbud headphones. I figure I can have some decent phones for the bus ride to Lotusphere and walking around (if needed...) :)

LOL - Edwards is on CNN compaining about the 99.5%+ of Americans who haven't voted yet (and assuming that they should vote for him...) and then talking about a woman who couldn't get a liver transplant in time. Could that be because slick ambulance chasers like Edwards have completely drove up insurance prices because of his antics and huge lawsuits?

Well... Ummm... Happy New Year!

So, I figure that a week into the year I should at least post something! As you've probably seen from Nathan, Tim, and Mike's blogs, things are pretty fun at Lotus 911 now preparing for Lotusphere 2008... But you'll hear more about that later.

Some random thoughts? Interesting watching the SEC dominating the bowls! If LSU hangs on, then I think the SEC will be 6-1 in bowls this year.

NH primary should be interesting. Will we see another Obama/Huckabee showing? Guess we'll know in 24 hours...

My 2007 In Review

This has been a year that was extremely different from anything I expected this time last year.

Personal
On March 15, we were blessed beyond measure with our 2nd child - Oliver (Ollie) Thomas!! He's crawling around really fast now, trying to stand up, eating some solids (with his 2 teeth), and generally just getting into all kinds of things with his wonderful big sister. Though we were expecting Ollie, he wasn't the only change in our household. The other big change was taking a new job with Lotus 911 and moving from South Carolina to Georgia. There were a lot of amazing little things associated with this move that still blow us away. I've not really shared it publicly, but we've seen God move in some great ways through it all. A quick run-down:

- I started my job on May 29.
- When I told my mother I had accepted the position, she told me that the night before she had been up all night praying and reading her Bible (for reasons she had no clue about at the time).
- We listed our house on a Saturday and had a signed contract by Wednesday.
- A former co-worker of my mother has a sister-in-law who is a great realtor in Kennesaw. Not only did she help with that, but she and her husband allowed me to live in their basement apartment for about 3 weeks. For free!
- My mom's sister works for a large mortgage company in SC but was able to help us with our loan in GA.
- About halfway through June we found our house in Acworth.
- We sold our house in Rock Hill on the last Wednesday of June and signed on our house here two days later and moved in that Saturday.
- As you can tell, June was pretty much a blur. The house is great and even the colors ended up matching the stuff we moved here!!
- And in the change, Emma Grace is just loving her pre-k school and her new friends!

That part of the moving experience was a true encouragement and we also saw God move in some other ways through that. Amazing.

Work
I started off the year with some System i projects to work on and figured I would have a relatively quiet year with Domino. We got some new systems in at the phone company and IBM didn't have them put together, so that ended up being my job. It was pretty sweet piecing together a couple of 570s from the rack up and then working with IBM to build some LPARs and finally move over the Domino cluster. Along the way, there was also the whole DST debacle for the world! I did start working with the open Beta of Notes 8.0 and got a quote in Computerworld. I also finally took my last exam to become a PCLP for ND 7 (I plan on updating to 8 at Lotusphere 2008). But then I started talking to Nathan about whether there was anything open at Lotus 911. For the most part I was just looking for something different and more challenging. Of course there were some other factors, too. Things moved rather quickly and I was able to start with Lotus 911 the last week of May - after 7 years at Comporium.

My expectations of doing mostly System i stuff for 2007 were pretty much turned upside down and it's been "Yellow" work since then! I've been blessed to be working at a Lotus Beacon Award winner for most of this year!! I've learned so much and worked with many products that I wouldn't have touched otherwise. From working with a Whale Appliance to Quickr and Connections and participating in several Lotus Design Partner programs, I've been really kicking the learning into high gear. Then there's the customer assignments - some can be in swank locations, but they all allow me to work with Lotus products! The traveling has been cool (for the most part!), and the amount has been in line with what I was told (so that's cool too!). I've also learned a lot from seeing the different environments that we support. I could probably go on and on about this, but I'll just say that it's great working not only with some of the more well-known names in the community but with all of the other less public folks at Lotus 911. I had to laugh the other day because we were in an internal training session and there were 4 bloggers in the room and one on the phone!! I'm hoping that we can get some others blogging real soon... ;)

Etc...
Some other highlights include:

• Getting my review of Neal Morse's Sola Scriptura album linked from Neal's site! (By the way, Neal has a new album coming out soon...)
• Going to see Gilbert, Petrucci, and Satriani at G3 in Myrtle Beach with Dale
  
• Going to New York twice - I got to see the Yankees beat the Red Sox as well as hang out with Curt and Mitch the first time and then was in Times Square for a few days the second time.
• I was able to also visit with some old college friends since we go through their towns going from GA to different places in SC as well as hang out with some of Jen's family while in NH

I could probably think of some other things that I didn't blog about already. As you can tell, it's been a year of transitions. I'm blessed to have a loving and supportive wife sticking by my side and two wonderful children! Even though it's been tough sometimes with the adjustments, it's also been a blessing - especially with my family with me. We've definitely missed our family in SC, but we've seen them a lot (and have been on the road a lot as well!).

So, here's wishing you and yours many wonderful blessings in 2008. And as you begin the new year, may this be your resolution:

Continue steadfastly in prayer, being watchful in it with thanksgiving. At the same time, pray also for us, that God may open to us a door for the word, to declare the mystery of Christ, on account of which I am in prison—that I may make it clear, which is how I ought to speak. Conduct yourselves wisely toward outsiders, making the best use of the time. Let your speech always be gracious, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how you ought to answer each person. (Colossians 4:2-6)

The Christmas Story

I would just like to present to you a generally chronological synopsis of the Christmas Story from the Gospels of Matthew and Luke. Those passages from Matthew are in italics. All scripture taken from the English Standard Version.

In the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God to a city of Galilee named Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David. And the virgin's name was Mary. And he came to her and said, "Greetings, O favored one, the Lord is with you!" But she was greatly troubled at the saying, and tried to discern what sort of greeting this might be. And the angel said to her, "Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. And behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus. He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God will give to him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and of his kingdom there will be no end." And Mary said to the angel, "How will this be, since I am a virgin?" And the angel answered her, "The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you; therefore the child to be born will be called holy--the Son of God. And behold, your relative Elizabeth in her old age has also conceived a son, and this is the sixth month with her who was called barren. For nothing will be impossible with God." And Mary said, "Behold, I am the servant of the Lord; let it be to me according to your word." And the angel departed from her. In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a town in Judah, and she entered the house of Zechariah and greeted Elizabeth. And when Elizabeth heard the greeting of Mary, the baby leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Spirit, and she exclaimed with a loud cry, "Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb! And why is this granted to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me? For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the baby in my womb leaped for joy. And blessed is she who believed that there would be a fulfillment of what was spoken to her from the Lord." And Mary said, "My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant. For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for he who is mighty has done great things for me, and holy is his name. And his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation. He has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts; he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate; he has filled the hungry with good things, and the rich he has sent empty away. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, as he spoke to our fathers, to Abraham and to his offspring forever." And Mary remained with her about three months and returned to her home.

Now the birth of Jesus Christ took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly. But as he considered these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream, saying, "Joseph, son of David, do not fear to take Mary as your wife, for that which is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit. She will bear a son, and you shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins." All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet: "Behold, the virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel" (which means, God with us). When Joseph woke from sleep, he did as the angel of the Lord commanded him: he took his wife, but knew her not until she had given birth to a son. And he called his name Jesus.

In those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus that all the world should be registered. This was the first registration when Quirinius was governor of Syria. And all went to be registered, each to his own town. And Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the town of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David, which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and lineage of David, to be registered with Mary, his betrothed, who was with child. And while they were there, the time came for her to give birth. And she gave birth to her firstborn son and wrapped him in swaddling cloths and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the inn. And in the same region there were shepherds out in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And an angel of the Lord appeared to them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were filled with fear. And the angel said to them, "Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of a great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be a sign for you: you will find a baby wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger." And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased!" When the angels went away from them into heaven, the shepherds said to one another, "Let us go over to Bethlehem and see this thing that has happened, which the Lord has made known to us." And they went with haste and found Mary and Joseph, and the baby lying in a manger. And when they saw it, they made known the saying that had been told them concerning this child. And all who heard it wondered at what the shepherds told them. But Mary treasured up all these things, pondering them in her heart. And the shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all they had heard and seen, as it had been told them. And at the end of eight days, when he was circumcised, he was called Jesus, the name given by the angel before he was conceived in the womb. And when the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, they brought him up to Jerusalem to present him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, "Every male who first opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord") and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, "a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons." Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon, and this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him. And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ. And he came in the Spirit into the temple, and when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for him according to the custom of the Law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, "Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to your people Israel." And his father and his mother marveled at what was said about him. And Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, "Behold, this child is appointed for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign that is opposed (and a sword will pierce through your own soul also), so that thoughts from many hearts may be revealed." And there was a prophetess, Anna, the daughter of Phanuel, of the tribe of Asher. She was advanced in years, having lived with her husband seven years from when she was a virgin, and then as a widow until she was eighty-four. She did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day. And coming up at that very hour she began to give thanks to God and to speak of him to all who were waiting for the redemption of Jerusalem.

Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, "Where is he who has been born king of the Jews? For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him." When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all Jerusalem with him; and assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They told him, "In Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet: "'And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, are by no means least among the rulers of Judah; for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.'" Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. And he sent them to Bethlehem, saying, "Go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word, that I too may come and worship him." After listening to the king, they went on their way. And behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy. And going into the house they saw the child with Mary his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him. Then, opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold and frankincense and myrrh. And being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way. Now when they had departed, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said, "Rise, take the child and his mother, and flee to Egypt, and remain there until I tell you, for Herod is about to search for the child, to destroy him." And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod. This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet, "Out of Egypt I called my son." Then Herod, when he saw that he had been tricked by the wise men, became furious, and he sent and killed all the male children in Bethlehem and in all that region who were two years old or under, according to the time that he had ascertained from the wise men. Then was fulfilled what was spoken by the prophet Jeremiah: "A voice was heard in Ramah, weeping and loud lamentation, Rachel weeping for her children; she refused to be comforted, because they are no more." But when Herod died, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared in a dream to Joseph in Egypt, saying, "Rise, take the child and his mother and go to the land of Israel, for those who sought the child's life are dead." And he rose and took the child and his mother and went to the land of Israel. But when he heard that Archelaus was reigning over Judea in place of his father Herod, he was afraid to go there, and being warned in a dream he withdrew to the district of Galilee.

And he went and lived in a city called Nazareth, that what was spoken by the prophets might be fulfilled: "He shall be called a Nazarene."

And when they had performed everything according to the Law of the Lord, they returned into Galilee, to their own town of Nazareth.

Santa Mentioned in the Bible?

It's very possible. Check out Zechariah 2:6 in the King James Version:

"Ho, ho, come forth, and flee from the land of the north"

There may even be a mention of the Christmas tree in Jeremiah 10:3-4:

3For the customs of the peoples are worthless;
they cut a tree out of the forest,
and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel.

4They adorn it with silver and gold;
they fasten it with hammer and nails
so it will not totter.

Of course these are not prophecies about modern Christmas customs, but they're cute, eh?

Domino 8: 101 - Unread Marks Enhancements

Anyone who has worked with Domino mail replicas knows that there is a history of problems with unread mark synchronization. With Domino 8, there have been at least two areas of improvements.

First of all, there is a new notes.ini setting: ADMINP_EXCHANGE_ALL_UNREAD_MARKS=1. This new setting is available for Domino 6.5.6, 7.0.3, and 8.0. It is detailed in Technote 1245043. This setting will exchange all unread marks in new replicas created via the Administration Process (instead of only the default 90 days worth). Also, it requires that only the source server be running the fixed version of the server code.

Secondly is a new option in the Create Replica(s) dialog box. As depicted in the graphic below, there is a new option to "Exchange Unread marks on replication":


This works very similarly to the notes.ini setting described above. If the source server is at Domino 8.0*, then the Administration Process will "attempt to match all of the unread marks from the source database with the target database."

* - I had hoped that this would work with Domino 6.5.6 or 7.0.3 servers like the notes.ini setting, but it does not. The source server and Administrator Client have to both be at 8.0 or higher.

Congrats Lotus 911!!

Big congrats to Lotus 911 for winning the Best Philanthropy Award from Lotus for the work we've done with AngelFlight Mission Control!!

From Nathan's blog, "It coordinates flight plans for private pilots to take sick kids for urgent medical care in locations they can't otherwise reach. The system got particularly put under the gun in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, when FEMA requested assistance in moving medical supplies and equipment."

Some Christmas Thoughts...

You may remember last year that I did a series of posts for "The 12 Days of Christmas" - I know we're about halfway through it now, but go check it out for some reading between now and Christmas.

Quickr 8.0.0.2 HF6 Available

I think I beat everyone to the punch... ;)

Go get it at Fix Central

Knight Industries Two Thousand

Or as we know it - KITT...


I was saddened to read at Derek's blog yesterday that the new KITT for the Knight Rider TV show will be a riced-up Mustang GTKR (that's King of the Road - an even more powerful Shelby GT500). You just don't go messing with the tradition of KITT being a Trans-Am!! Here's the pony-car KITT:

Personally, I think the last T-A manufactured would still be a great KITT - the 2002 WS-6:

But if they have to go with a new vehicle, might I propose something even better - that they wait a year for the show and use the new Trans-Am. Hopefully GM will produce a 2009 T-A when they produce the Camaro for next year. This is a mock-up of a T-A, but it's based off of the Camaro body.


Now, I have nothing against Mustangs - here's my father-in-law's. I would choose a T-A over a Mustang anyday, though. (Sorry Jen...) Even Jen thinks that it's just wrong to use a Mustang for KITT and she loves Mustangs!

Oh well...

My New Default Mail Client Is Outlook...

But that may be about the only thing I don't like about my iPhone!! I guess I could sync the contacts with my Yahoo account, but I never use that account except to chat with like 2 people.

Anyway, I've had the iPhone for about a couple of weeks now (early xmas gift from the parents...). :) My daughter really likes it too - we were watching some Veggie Tales clips on YouTube earlier! And she likes my new music phone too! She says "it plays music and it's a phone, and everything else". This device really is all it's cracked up to be. Of course there are some "oddities" to get used to, but it's extremely intuitive and simple to just pick up and use. Here is a quick list of some of my pros and cons...

Pros:
- The screen is superb. Not only is the output great, but the touch screen is slick (think about how your car feels when you wax it) and is supposedly scratch-resistant. The sales lady told me to try scratching the demo unit with my keys (I didn't, though...)
- An all-in-one device. Sure there are others that could do most of what this does. But I don't know of any with as much storage. It would be nice to be able to add more, but an 8GB MicroSD chip for will set you back ~$90 (on eBay) for other devices.
- SMS - Love the chat interface with SMS!
- Apps - they're all browser-based. I like the Google and Facebook apps. My other app is iBibleSpace
- 8GB - The storage really isn't that bad. I can load up all of my favorite albums, podcasts, etc and still have room left over.
- Speakers - While they're not hi-fi, they work really well in a quiet room (good for spinning some tunes while working in the garage, etc...)

Cons:
- Battery life - it's a full-featured PDA, phone, iPod Video with Wi-Fi. What do you expect. I can charge it every other day if I pushed it (depending on usage).
- Sync-only - Unlike the other iPod models, the iPhone is sync-only. I generally like to just drag files from iTunes onto my iPod (from multiple machines). I have resorted to dragging files to an "iPhone" playlist and just synching that playlist with my iPhone. Not quite as flexible, but it works.
- Bluetooth - It works well, but it's a little kludgey sometimes. For instance if my headset is on and I answer a call from the iPhone I have to manually tell the iPhone to use the headset.

Domino 8:101 - New Administration Features

There are many new administrative features available with Lotus Domino 8.0 and beyond. I have been working on a series of posts to cover these options. This post will be updated with links to the other posts in the series.

Mandated ID Encryption Standard - New feature with Domino 8.0.1 to allow corporations to mandate AES encryption in Notes ID files.

Admin Preferences and Client Versions - New Admin Client preferences and details of the new Client Versions View

Enhanced Quota Feature - A new option to proactively enforce quotas

Inbox Maintenance - A new AdminP function to clean up the inbox

ODS 48 - Details about the new On Disk Structure

Preferred Simple Search and Deferred Sort Index Creation - Information on these two new features

Server OS Upgrades - What you need to know about the supported Operating Systems for Domino 8

Unread Marks Enhancements - There are two enhancements to better replicate unread marks on replica creation.

In Honor of Rich's Idea...

Rich posted an idea yesterday for more percussion at JamFest. This is in honor of that...

Are These Good Ideas?

I think so - you be the judge...

Are These Good Ideas?

I think so - you be the judge...

Incentive to buy the $8 water?

Fox Files: Dirty Hotel Secrets: When you check into a hotel room, ever wonder how clean it is? FOX reporter Dana Fowle has an exclusive story that has county health inspectors reacting.

Santa's Visit 2007

Santa visited our two kids and my nephew at my parents' house on Thanksgiving... Thanks Santa!!

More Sametime 8.0 Stuff

While we're on Sametime...

The process for placing the network install package on the Sametime server to be able to download it from stcenter has changed (drastically) with Sametime 8.0. There is a thread on the topic at devWorks: Sametime 8.0 Client Download - "this feature has not been enabled". Even after following the instructions for setting this up, some (myself included) were still receiving the "this feature has not been enabled" error message.

Apparently, the trick is clearing your browser cache... d'oh! After getting it working, you get this cool little install window that will include a progress meter and an option to just save the files...

Update From IBM On The Sametime 8.0 Fixes

Adam posted some updates to the "kurfuffle" regarding the Sametime 8.0 hotfixes I mentioned the other day. Thanks for the updates regarding the fixes Adam!

Update on Lotus Sametime 8 hotfix
and
Follow up on Lotus Sametime 8 hotfix

Gospel of Judas Update

Back in 2006, I wrote three posts about the newly "discovered" Gospel of Judas:

Part I - General Information
Part II - Thoughts on the Translation
Part III - National Geographic Channel TV Special

We all remember a ton of fanfare about this finding. I even had someone tell me that it would undermine Christianity as we know it! Well, I doubt you'll see any fanfare about the latest information on this translation. To say that the translators made sophomoric mistakes would be an insult to sophomores.

All of the information you need to know is covered in this post by Dr. Albert Mohler: Revising the Revisionists -- New Controversy over "The Gospel of Judas". The real kicker is that the translator(s) chose to translate "daimon" as "spirit" - thus Judas is actually referred to as a demon in the document and not as just a spirit!

I believe that Dr. Mohler sums it up very well:

This controversy should serve as a sober reminder that media reports about supposed discoveries may not be at all what is claimed. Indeed, the bigger the claim of a blockbuster discovery, the more care and oversight is required. The impression of this story left in the public mind is based in a series of mistranslations. Most people will never know the real story.

I stated the following in my Part III post about a mention of this Gospel by Irenaeus in the 2nd Century:

"It should make one wonder what the producers of the NGC special had in mind when they couldn't quote the only verifiable mention of this gospel that has ever been recorded before the Gospel was abandoned not to be read again until the past few years."

Now we're left to wonder just what the NGC's thought process was after seeing all of the simple mistranlations described in Professor April D. DeConick's piece in the NY Times that Dr. Mohler references coupled with their deliberate exclusion of what Irenaeus wrote about the gospel shortly after it was penned.