Cross-platform word processor: AbiWord 2.6

Abiword runs on multiple operating systems, and has come out with it's newest 2.6 release for Windows. The Linux version has to be compiled, or the Linux user has to wait for the Repositories for their specific distribution to offer the update. That is the "age-old Linux problem" mentioned in the title of the following review. That's not a show stopper for me, as I can wait a bit for for that. Meanwhile, the Windows version is easy to install, and super to use:

New AbiWord looks solid but suffers from age-old Linux problem

[...] Lightweight and peppy yet loaded to the core, AbiWord 2.6 is as good as they come. With the latest release, you get a few templates to create documents from, and the program spell-checks text as you type. AbiWord is multilingual and lets you input text in various languages, including English, French, German, Finnish, and several Indian languages. You can configure the editor to autosave documents after specific time intervals and maintain document history. You can also compare two documents currently open in AbiWord and find similarities in content, format, and styles.


As in previous versions, AbiWord responds to Emacs or vi key bindings. For lazy Web editors like me, it's a way to generate simple HTML as well. The latest version can create a valid XML page and embed formatting in the document itself or as external CSS stylesheets.

The new version can track document revisions from multiple sources as well as show a document before and after applying the suggested revisions. There's also a find feature to move to the next or previous revision, which can either be accepted, rejected, or purged. AbiWord allows you to add a comment for a particular revision, but I couldn't figure out how to read that comment afterward. [...]

It loads faster than OpenOffice, and has a smaller footprint. I've been using OpenOffice in our business, but I may switch to AbiWord now, as OpenOffice is a bit of overkill for our needs. I'll keep'em both, because OpenOffice does have some advanced Desktop publishing features, but I don't need them for everyday use. Abiword would be fine for the daily routine stuff, and simple Desktop Publishing too.

Now I'm just waiting for the 2.6 version update to be offered in my favorite Linux Distros too. I'm glad to have Abiword as an easy to use option.
     

Osprey sighting this morning...

I heard it before I saw it. I had just let the ducks out of their pen, and was going to let the chickens out of their coop, when I heard it call. Some of the local blackbirds were also making noise, upset about it's presence.


I thought it might be a Hawk, but a look through the binoculars, plus Pat and Andy's opinions, led us to conclude it was an Osprey. It was just sitting on the branch of a dead tree, in the morning sun. My camera does not have a powerful zoom. So I trod through the woods to get as close as I could. This was as close as I could get:


At that point it became aware of my presence, and flew off. I snapped a photo, but missed it, too many branches in the way. It was BIG, and glorious.

As I've said before, birds are hard to photograph. But it's ever so tempting to try.

Pat posted a photo on his blog of an osprey, which is more like what we saw through the binoculars.
     

McCain and Health Care

From the Boston Herald Editorial Staff:
McCain gets it right on health care
Examines the strengths and weaknesses of McCain's proposals thus far.

From the Dallas Morning News, Op/Ed:
Nancy Kruh: Rating McCain's plan
Excerpts of commentary from various political pundits.

From Star Parker at Townhall:
McCain is right on health care
While acknowledging there are still details to be worked out, she says he's moving in the right direction for the right reasons, and explains why.
     

New Ubuntu 8.04 has WUBI installer

The most recent version of Linux Ubuntu, Hardy Heron 8.04, features a WUBI installer (Windows-based Ubuntu Installer) that allows you to install Ubuntu from windows onto your windows partition, allowing you to boot both operating systems without repartitioning your hard drive.

Linux Journal Gadget Guy, Shawn Powers, demonstrates installing Ubuntu on a machine running Windows with the Wubi installer in this 4 minute video:



Wubi makes it much easier for Windows users who want to try Linux without having to repartition their hard drive.

I've been using Ubuntu Hardy Heron 8.04 lately, and it's the most solid Ubuntu I've tried to date. I didn't use the WUBI installer, I installed it to it's own partition, but WUBI is a good option Windows users to start with.

I think some Windows users might prefer a more polished Ubuntu derivative, like Linux Mint, which has all the multimedia codecs already installed for you, providing a more immediate windows-like experience. But since Ubuntu 8.04 was only just released, it will be a bit of time before Linux Mint and others come out with their versions, but we should be seeing them appearing soon, hopefully with the WUBI installer included.

You can read more about WUBI here:

WUBI FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions, with screenshots)
     

Mexico's National Anthem Lyrics

Some people like to complain that America's "Star Spangled Banner" Anthem is too militaristic. But I say it's pretty tame, compared to Mexico's National Anthem lyrics. Maynard at Tammy Bruce's blog has published them there. I had no idea. Can you say "bloody"?:

The Mexican National Anthem

[...]
Stanza V:
War, war without quarter to any who dare
to tarnish the country's coat of arms!
War, war! Let the national banners be soaked in waves of blood.
War, war! In the mountain, in the valley,
let the cannons thunder in horrid unison
and may the sonorous echoes resound
with cries of Union! Liberty!

Stanza VI:
Oh Fatherland, ere your children, defenseless
bend their neck beneath the yoke,
may your fields be watered with blood,
may they leave their footprints in blood.
And may your temples, palaces and towers
collapse with horrid clamor,
and their ruins continue on, saying:
Of a thousand heroes, this fatherland was. [...]

And there's plenty of war references in the rest. Read the whole thing, for your "multicultural edification", as Maynard would say. Yikes. He makes a fun remark about sanctuary cities in this context.

And if there is not enough blood for you there, you can always check out Tammy's post about Michelle Obama's latest remark:

"I Want To Rip Bill Clinton's Eyes Out"
     

McCain, Corn and Ethanol Mandates

McCain urges Bush to waive ethanol rules

John McCain has joined 23 fellow Republicans in urging the Bush administration to waive requirements for high ethanol production, blaming the alternative fuel for driving up US food prices.

McCain has long opposed government subsidies for ethanol, but the presidential hopeful tempered his criticism in advance of this winter's caucus in corn-growing Iowa. Despite praising ethanol as "a good alternative" to gas, McCain lost Iowa by a large margin.

The Republican's latest denunciation of ethanol came in a letter to Stephen Johnson, head of the US environmental protection agency. Two dozen senators, including McCain, asked Johnson to waive an ethanol mandate that many in their party backed a half year ago.

"It isn't a surprise that food prices are rising when more than 25% of the corn grown today is taken out of the food supply and instead used for subsidised ethanol production," McCain said in a statement.

"We need to put an end to flawed government policies that distort the markets, raise food prices artificially, and pit producers against consumers."

[...]

Barack Obama, who represents the mid-western state of Illinois, has defended ethanol amid controversy over corn's role in driving up the price of fuel and food. McCain's criticism of ethanol mandates may bolster his reputation for forthrightness, but it also could bolster Obama's claim to contest right-leaning Iowa in the November general election. [...]

Obama and the Democrats want to continue supporting corn-ethanol because it's politically correct on the left, and because rising food prices may help them win the White House in November, even though it's a problem created primarily by Democrats (Al Gore's deciding vote in 1994 pushed the legislation through). So ironically, the Democrats will be offering themselves as a solution to a problem THEY created!

The article also mentions restrictive tariffs against importing cheap sugar-based ethanol from Brazil. If ethanol production is supposed to be about solving our energy needs, then why are we blocking importation of cheap sources? McCain is also risking loosing support from Republican politicians from corn growing states by opposing the ethanol mandate. It seems that American ethanol production may be more about politics of government hand-outs than problem solving. Read the whole thing for more details about the politics of corn and government subsidies.


Related Link:

YOU CANT EAT ETHANOL ... FOOD VS. FUEL
     

They're still growing...

I didn't do my usual Weekly Chick Pic this past weekend, as there was a bunch of other stuff that needed my attention. And, I'm sure pics of baby chicks growing aren't all that interesting to most people. They are to me, because I handle them every day and they are almost like pets.




But also, birds are just plain difficult to photograph. They move around a lot. They often look away from the camera or flap their wings or run or otherwise make sudden movements that ruin a potentially good photograph.




Thank goodness for digital cameras, I couldn't afford the wasted film trying to photograph birds. I once read that Lucille Ball would not allow any pictures of birds in her house, because she loved birds and felt that pictures could never do them justice. I tend to agree, in the sense that much of what makes birds beautiful to look at is their movements.

I got a new video camera about a month ago, the ZR800 which I had talked about in an earlier post. I was actually hoping to do a short video of the chickies for the Farm Report, but other priorities took over. Maybe next week.
     

Europe, Japan, and collective psychosis: what ails the West, and how it might be healed

Takuan Seiyo at the Brussels Journal compares Western Culture with Japan's, to explore why the former seems to be slowly self destructing, while the latter is successfully diverging from that path.

Astarte and Amaterasu - The Diverging Destinies of Europe and Japan. -- Part 2

In the 1st part of this essay, we hypothesized that the European civilization, both in the mother continent and in its diaspora, is pursuing a path of gradual self-obliteration for reasons rooted in a deep, collective psychosis. We stated further that Japan has similar reasons to have acquired a deep collective psychosis, yet it is pursuing the path of life. We will try here to shed some light on the possible reasons for this divergence. [...]

The essay goes on to explore many interesting ideas. I can't possibly convey them all in a few excerpts, but I did find the following excerpt amusing. It poses a philosophical question, then gives a Japanese Eastern response, and a European Western response:

[...] Asked whether the dog has Buddha's nature, the Oriental sage lifts his leg to urinate on the questioner. And he will do so within a split second from the posing of the question. To arrive at this answer it will have taken him twenty years of shutting down the chatter of his mind, to align with his True Nature through arduous meditation.

The Western sage, facing the same question but having devoted his twenty years to acquiring a PhD in the hermeneutics of Jacques Lacan as applied to the transgender community's anal anxiety, will spend a year researching canine physiology and behavior, and another year reading scholarly works on Buddhism published in German, French and English since 1860. He will then write a book deconstructing the dog as a genetically programmed biological computer designed as a receptacle for the white man's proclivity for domination and exploitation.

The book will be published by a major imprint. It will receive glowing reviews in the New York Times, the Guardian and Le Monde. Herr Professor Doctor will be interviewed by BBC International and CNN. Soon the book will be on the college curriculum compulsory reading list throughout the Euroculture zone: from Sydney, Australia to Salzburg, Austria. Poisoning the minds of current voters and future leaders with the intellectual equivalent of Herr Professor's enema. Moreover, the European Parliament, quoting this book on the dais, will enact 168 new pet regulations, leading, eventually, to banning dog ownership altogether across the European Union.

The Orientals have no interest in and do not allow such rubbish. Let the stupid gaijin flock to Western Universities on the taxpayer's subsidy to take academic courses with titles like The Phallus, Queer Musicology, Blackness, Nonviolent Responses to Terrorism, and Drag: Theories of Transgenderism and Performance. In Japan, Korea and China, equally, one goes to university not to masturbate for four years at society's expense but to study nano and bio technology, medicine, and other useful things. [...]

That was my chuckle for the day! The article also touches on some other ideas, such as malignant narcissism, it's indulgence in Western culture and the resulting collective psychosis; the reasons for it, and possible solutions. In exploring these ideas, comparisons are made with Japan, to show how Japanese culture has avoided some of these pitfalls. Also examined is the roll of religion and it's integration in both cultures. A case is made, in part, that Christianity and the Age of Reason failed to completely reconcile, but that it may still not be too late.

Japan has it's own problems, no one is saying it's perfect, yet the comparisons Seiyo makes with Western culture and society are thought provoking. In attempting to sum it up in a paragraph or two, I may have oversimplified some of the more subtle ideas of the article; I do recommend reading the whole thing. Whether you agree with it all or not, there's plenty to chew on.
     

McCain leads Obama and Clinton in Gallup poll

From Lydia Saad at Gallup Daily:

Gallup Daily: McCain Moves to 6-Point Lead Over Obama

PRINCETON, NJ -- John McCain has moved to a six percentage point, 48% to 42%, lead over Barack Obama in Gallup Poll Daily tracking of the general election, while he edges out Hillary Clinton by only one point, 46% to 45%.


This is according to Gallup Poll Daily tracking from April 27-May 1 with 4,381 national registered voters.

The ongoing turmoil in the Democratic race -- with neither candidate able to sustain a winning streak in the primaries and animosity seemingly mounting between them -- seems to be benefiting McCain and hurting both Democrats. Last week McCain had fallen three points behind Clinton in the preferences of registered voters for the general election, and only tied Obama.

Although both Clinton and Obama have lost ground to McCain over the past week, the current results may be particularly troubling for Obama in trying to combat Clinton's assertion to superdelegates that she would be the more electable of the two candidates in November.

The current six-point margin for McCain over Obama is the largest lead McCain has had over either candidate since Gallup began tracking general election preferences in early March. The gap between Obama and Clinton's percentage of the vote when both are pitted against McCain is also the largest since the general election tracking began. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) Well that has cheered up my day. John McCain is doing a lot of things right, I admire the way he's been managing his campaign. You can read the rest of the article for details of the Democrat race.


Related Links:

Stuck in the middle

A riff on McCain - the right man at the right time

Obama: schizo, in denial or a pathological liar?
     

Why does China need a nuclear submarine fleet?

A fleet with nuclear weapons? From Michael Huntsman at the Brussels Journal:

Why Does China Need a Blue Water Navy?

[...] Today the Daily Telegraph reports yet another sign of its development of a blue water navy with a global strategic reach capable of threatening American and British cities: a huge underground naval base on the well-placed island of Hainan that, with good reason, is believed to be the home of its latest class of nuclear submarines equipped with nuclear weapons. Particularly noteworthy is the ability of departing and incoming submarines to leave and enter the base underwater, thus significantly enhancing their ability to remain hidden from prying eyes.

The day must surely come when this potential threat becomes a real one and yet we continue to adopt a mealy-mouthed appeasement towards China. Concerning the military threat that China will represent no more than ten years hence, we do absolutely nothing. With oil already at US $ 115 (65% more expensive than a year ago), China's thirst for oil is likely to keep that price spiralling ever upward. How long can our economy continue to function properly in those circumstances and when will the struggle for access to oil lead to a nascent confrontation between the West and China? And will we be ready for it? [...]

Beefing up our defenses and locating them strategically would be a good deterrent, but getting the funds to do so, from politicians who see no threat, and who wish to use the money on welfare programs instead... that's a battle in itself.
     

Extremists deplore the threat of humor

From A. Millar at the Brussels Journal:

Modern Britain: No Laughing Matter

[...] Political correctness has cowed society and politics, and trodden down common sense and humor. Unlike the defiant, bawdy Brit of the past, today he thinks before he speaks, running through the list of forbidden words, and making sure not to let one slip. And so much now is taboo. The English Democrats Party is under investigation for racism, for using the term, “tartan tax,” a student was arrested for calling a police horse “gay,” and, if you need to see the proof of such extreme “politically correct” intolerance, a Youtube video showing a young man being arrested for singing, “I’d rather wear a turban” (deemed racist by the arresting officer), can be seen here.

A common language is one of the traditional, defining marks of a nation, and the criminalization of words will have a very profound consequence for the British. Though rarely acknowledged as such, humor is another defining mark, and one that makes use of the nation’s language in particular ways that relies on the audience having a good general knowledge of culture, history, and politics. Notably, Voltaire once commented that tragedies could be translated from one tongue to another, but that comedies could not. Anyone wishing to grasp the English comedy would need to, “spend three years in London, to make yourself master of the English tongue, and to frequent the playhouse every night,” he suggested.

Political correctness has changed British politics and society, the latter of which has been famed for its ability to laugh at itself – an ability that has certainly helped to keep it free and democratic. Extremists – whether of the fascist, politically correct, or Islamic type – are united in their suspicion – even rejection – of humor. Humor shows them for what they really are. [...]

The article goes on to give more examples. The author laments that things that are solemn court cases now, would have been laughed at as material for a comedy sketch 10 years ago. It would have been inconceivable that such things would be taken seriously with the force of law. What has happened in that 10 years? I explored that question in a prior post:

Can political correctness destroy a nation?

The question is important, if only to prevent it from ever happening here. I watch with interest, and horror, as it continues to unfold there.
     

The resurgence of Europe's "spine"

It seems that local governments along Europe's historic "spine" are attempting to assert themselves. From Paul Belien at the Brussels Journal:

What’s Going Right in Europe – How Localism Might Save the Continent

[...] While France succumbs to North Africans and Germany to Turks, the parties from Old Lorraine, the spine of Europe, are preparing to fight for the preservation of their own identity. Owing to the massive immigration by people from an entirely different culture, many ordinary Europeans no longer feel at home in their own countries. Home is that cosy, often small, place where people feel safe among those whom they know and trust. The fight for the preservation of Europe is a fight for one’s own home, village, town, city, provence. That is why it is a localist issue.

Resistance to Islamization is not a matter of ideology, as one prominent American “anti-Jihadist” seems to think. The successful resistance in Europe has a provincial and an ethnic basis. It is about the right of the Europeans to hand their traditions, their identity, their cultural heritage down to their children so that the latter can continue to enjoy Europe’s ancient freedoms. The spirit of Old Lorraine has survived for 1,200 years. “Populist” parties in Flanders, Switzerland, Lombardia, Cologne and Alsace and other regions along the spine of Europe are popular for the simple reason that they are not prepared to let twelve centuries of capitalist self-reliance, self-governance and limited government fade away simply because foreigners are moving in with a spirit adapted to Arabian desert life. [...]

(bold emphasis mine) The article has some interesting figures on illegal immigration in Spain and Italy, the numerous amnesties that have been repeatedly granted over the years to assimilate them, and the political ramifications of that, but the article's not primarily just about immigration.

Belien goes into a detailed history of this European spine, where he claims capitalism in Europe had it's origins, and describes it as a place "...where citizens are still influenced by centuries of independence, self-reliance and adherence to a local identity that opposes centralizing authorities in far-away capitals."

It's interesting history, and it's interesting how he uses it as argument against Robert Spencer's argument that Jihadism should be fought as an ideology. I think there are merits in both points of view. Ethnicity and ideology are often closely linked, so it's not just a simple either/or scenario.

What I don't quite see is, how this spine of Europe is going to manage to exert any political power in the European Union, which seems hell-bent on ignoring or crushing such citizens. Yet there is also resistance to the EU from Ireland and other places, as discussed in one of the links below. It will be interesting to see where this goes.


Related articles at the Brussel's Journal:

Europe’s Fate and Turkey’s Progress

Freedom Fighters in Ireland, the Czech Republic and Germany Oppose EU Treaty
     

Ethanol and high food prices: the warnings were there years ago, but very few listened

Global warming hysteria lead politicians to "do something", regardless of the facts and warnings about what ethanol production would do to food prices. From Neal Boortz at Nealz Nuze:

CONCEDING THE BIOFUEL ARGUMENT ... NOT ME, THE POLITICIANS

But not now ... then.

Finally, somebody in DC is addressing the fact that ethanol production may have something to do with the increase in world food prices. Gee, ya think? I wonder what their first clue was.

Just yesterday Condi Rice said, "There has been apparently some effect, unintended consequence from the alternative fuels effort." Unintended consequences? Food costs rising 8% since 2005 ... People, even members of Congress, have been warned for years about the consequences of mandated ethanol production. Then there's this article from CNN Money dated back to 2006, or this one from almost one year ago warning us about ethanol's affect on food costs. Still not convinced? Go back to the 2004 election where ethanol was a really nice talking point for politicians. The New York Times even pointed out the problem of rising food prices due to mandatory ethanol production in January of 2006.

To give you one more piece of information, take a look at this article printed in the Science Daily back in Aug. 8, 2001. Here is what scientists have known since years:

The approximately $1 billion a year in current federal and state subsidies (mainly to large corporations) for ethanol production are not the only costs to consumers, the Cornell scientist observes. Subsidized corn results in higher prices for meat, milk and eggs because about 70 percent of corn grain is fed to livestock and poultry in the United States Increasing ethanol production would further inflate corn prices, Pimentel says, noting: "In addition to paying tax dollars for ethanol subsidies, consumers would be paying significantly higher food prices in the marketplace."

Back in 1994 when Al Gore cast the tie breaking vote in the Senate that led to a methanol mandate from the EPA we were told that "the price of corn flakes isn't going to go up by one penny." Hind sight truly is 20-20.

This is what happens when politicians decide to value hysteria, emotional thinking and feel-goodism over science, reason and basic math.

It was the Democrats who lead this irrational charge into nonsense that is now raising food prices world wide. Yes, they had bi-partisan support from many Republicans who they suckered into the Ethanol boondoggle. But it was none other than enviro-wacko Al Gore who cast the tie breaking vote that pushed through the ethanol program. There's an Inconvenient Truth.

Now that we have rising food prices, will Gore take the credit? I doubt it. Because the price rises are occurring during a Republican administration, I bet he and the Democrats will try to put the blame on the Republicans. This is what the Republicans get for supporting pie-in-the-sky legislation from Democrats.

John McCain had spoken out against Ethanol production for many years, but more recently he also caved into the pressure to support it. He shouldn't have, because he was right all along.

The question now is, who's going to fix this government-created mess? Will anyone have the nerve to say we should scrap the Ethanol subsidies?


Related Links:

Undoing America's Ethanol Mistake

Mark Steyn: Feed your Prius, starve a peasant

Rising food costs are due to Ethanol Boondoggle
     

Optical Illusion: The Spinning Dancer

It's a moving .gif file, so I can't post it here on the blog, but here is the link to it:

The Truth About the Spinning Dancer

[...] The silhouette image of the spinning dancer doesn’t have any depth cues. As a result, your eyes will sometimes see the dancer standing on her left leg and spinning to the right. And sometimes they will perceive her as standing on her right leg and spinning to the left. Most people, if they stare at the image long enough, will eventually see her turn both ways. [...]

I couldn't see the flip at first, but then happened if I stared at her lowest foot, or looked at the image from my peripheral vision. Too weird.

This has been a popular email attachment, apparently. The article discusses the illusion and it's relation to vision, and has some links to other illusions, too.
     

Austrian House of Horrors Revealed

It was in Austria, but it sure wasn't the Von Trapp family. More like a "trapped" family. We all have problems in our lives, but things like this help you remember, that there is often somebody worse off than you:

'House of Horror children never saw daylight'

Austrian Man Confesses to Keeping Daughter, Her Children Captive in Cellar

The links have photos, video, more information. I'm not gonna publish excerpts because, frankly, I'd rather not think about it anymore today. Yikes.

I hope the Mom and the kids get rich selling the movie rights. I can only wonder if those kids will ever be able to have normal lives, having spent their entire childhood in a windowless basement. Never seen daylight! Too bizarre.
     

As in Spain, so also in the world at large?

I've been thinking for some time that the entire world seems to moving Left politically, dragging the Center and Right with it. This recent article by Soeren Kern at the Brussels Journal talks about the conservative party in Spain, but I see a lot of parallels with conservatism in the USA and elsewhere:

Spanish Conservatives Face Identity Crisis, Power Struggle

Spanish conservatives are now in open warfare against each other as two opposing factions seek to gain control over the ideological future of the center-right Partido Popular (PP), the main opposition party in Spain. The internal battle has been brewing for a number of years, but has become a very public affair ever since Mariano Rajoy, the party’s leader, lost the general election on March 9.

The fact that the winner of that election, Socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero, was at best a mediocre candidate, one who should have been relatively easy to defeat at the polls, has added to calls for a major reform of the PP. And adding injury to insult, the 2008 vote was a virtual replay of the previous general election in 2004, when Zapatero defeated Rajoy by a similar margin. [...]

Spain's conservative party has been trying to hold together a coalition of center right groups, but there is a power struggle within the party between religious and secular elements. Unless they can find common ground for compromise, they may be stuck, and continue to lose elections. Read the whole thing for the details. But I found it not only educational about Spanish politics; I see this same struggle happening in many other countries as well. It's a new global political reality that conservatives everywhere are having to contend with.
     

Farm Report: More Naked Chicks

That title should do wonders for my site meter tally from Google searches. The older chick is now 3 weeks old, and the younger, 2 weeks. The oldest seems to have most of it's feathers now, and likes to fly a lot. I think it sees itself as more of a bald eagle than a chicken:



The younger one does it's best to imitate the older one, and has learned to fly also, but just barely. It can fly up to the rim of the blue box they live in:



Here they are with their surrogate mom (me):



They stretch their wings and legs in the big wide world, a.k.a. the back porch:



I still see "Mutt & Jeff" whenever I look at them together.




Related Link:

Farm Report: The Weekly Chick Pic
     

When a Mosquito is a GOOD thing

From Tammy Bruce:
Noise Audible Only to Teens Used Against Loiterers

A wall-mounted gadget designed to drive away loiterers with a shrill, piercing noise audible only to teens and young adults is infuriating civil liberties groups and tormenting young people after being introduced into the United States...

The high-frequency sound has been likened to fingernails dragged across a chalkboard or a pesky mosquito buzzing in your ear. It can be heard by most people in their teens and early 20s who still have sensitive hair cells in their inner ears...

It's been used successfully in Europe, where of course it's now being challenged by some politicians as "racist". From the Brussels Journal:

European Parliament Should Not Ban Mosquito, Says Inventor

A letter from Howard Stapleton

Dear Sir,

My name is Howard Stapleton. I am the inventor of the Mosquito. The main drive behind my invention was that my 15-year-old daughter was unable to enter our local shop owing to a gang of badly behaved teenagers loitering in the doorway and making a nuisance of themselves. As I discovered later, and sales of my device have proved, this was not an isolated case. Can the Members of the European Parliament who are campaigning to ban my device offer an alternative so that the blight of anti social teenage behaviour can otherwise be resolved without involving millions of Euros?

[...]

I find it extraordinary that an inexpensive solution to a serious problem is at risk of being cast aside for what I can only assume are political motives. Every time I have been interviewed on radio or T.V. where members of the public have been asked their view more than 70 per cent were in favour. Many went on to suggest the Civil Liberties campaigner or the M.P.s who wanted to ban the Mosquito come and live at their address. They would then get a taste of what it was like to visit local shops or children’s play areas trying to avoid often drunken and abusive teenagers. They want our streets returned to law-abiding citizens and will support anyone who can help. [...]

Should people be forced to tolerate anti-social behavior, physical attacks and crime, and have their businesses disrupted by gangs driving away their customers, just to avoid being called racist? Many Leftists think so. Yet far more disturbing than the device, is the fact that it's become necessary for so many people to use it just to maintain safety and protect their businesses. There was a time when such devices were not needed. What's happened to the concepts of law and order and a civil society?

Read the whole thing for more details of this fascinating and simple invention, and the political attempts to stop it.
     

"God Damn America" taken out of context?

This is the ad that's created such a fuss? Why? It just reminds everyone of what kind of Church Obama has attended for 20 years. What part of it isn't true? It makes perfect sense to preach "God Damn America" if you hate this country and think it's bad and evil. It also makes perfect sense to attend a church that teaches that if you agree with it. Duh.

I see Bill Moyer's (who has a long history of activism with the American Communist Party and related groups), did a softball interview with Rev. Wright, who insisted his comments were taken out of context. It begs the question, "What context makes 'God Damn America' a good thing to say?"

I fear I know too well. I lived in San Francisco for 23 years, and many people there agree with Wright. Many of them also happen to be communists and hard core socialists (or their overly emotional, easily manipulated "useful idiots"). They believe that America is evil because it is capitalist, and cannot be redeemed, until it CHANGES by renouncing capitalism.

Rev. Wright preaches Liberation Theology, which is Marxism dressed in religious clothing. Obama's church teaches that "middle classness" is wrong. Can you imagine what kind of "change" it is that Obama wants to bring about?




God Damn America? How about God Damn the main stream media, for refusing to talk openly and honestly about what Wright and Obama really believe?

The comments made by Wright are nothing compared to Obama's actual ties to terrorists and terrorist groups:

Muslims for Obama

Barack's other terrorist buddy

Obama's radical Marxist friend

Obama's Kenyan Muslim Friends burn churches

Barack and Michelle and Bill and Bernardine: The Obama/Weather Underground compendium

And lets not forget his leftist foreign policy advisers, who're themselves foreigners:

Obama and his leftist foreign policy advisers

A thorough examination of these would do a lot to put "change you can believe in" into context. But don't hold your breath waiting for the MSM to tell you.


UPDATE 04-28-08

Rev. Wright maintains that "God Damn America" was taken out of context. It's that's true, then seeing the whole sermon should remedy that. And now you can see the whole sermon, on-line:

Videos of Wright's “God Damn America” sermon

Does the context change the meaning? See it and judge for yourself.
     

Yes He Can...

H.T. Kim Jong-Il: “Yes I Can” Music Video