The major networks are streaming their content for free already. I know, I know, you don’t pay for the major networks, you do for HBO or Showtime. Let’s look at it in a different way. If HBO and Showtime started streaming their premium programs (shows, not movies) for free, but with limited commercial interruptions (just like the networks do on their respective sites), they could be reaching out to millions of more people and see additional revenue in new advertising. This is something they don’t see on their channels, as they do not show advertising. My theory is that most people don’t subscribe to a channel for one TV show. They also enjoy the other benefits the channel has to offer (other shows, new movies, sporting events, documentaries). If that channel starts streaming television shows I doubt you’d see people drop their subscription, and if you do, the amount that would would be far less than the amount you would gain by advertisements on the stream. I also think it could help them pick up subscribers. If people become interested enough in the shows to look at what else the channel has to offer, they could become new paying customers. I think it would be a smart move for the premium networks to look into this. Streaming content is not going away.

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Increasingly perceived as a transcendent player, Cardinals first baseman Albert Pujols overcame his team’s fourth-place finish and a Bunyanesque second half by Philadelphia Phillies first baseman Ryan Howard to earn election as the 2008 National League Most Valuable Player.

Pujols, who also won the award in 2005, becomes the first Dominican-born player to earn multiple MVP titles.

Pujols, 28, amassed 37 home runs and 116 RBI in a season hampered by a strained calf that forced him to the disabled list and a nerve condition that caused him to undergo surgery last month.

Universally perceived as an overachieving team in transition, the Cardinals stayed in contention for more than five months while drafting behind El Hombre’s daunting consistency.

Pujols had finished second three times in balloting during his eight-year career — twice to Barry Bonds and once to Howard in 2006. Just as Pujols won this time without reaching the postseason, Howard won previously by keeping the Phillies in contention. Though denied a second Gold Glove Award earlier this month, Pujols is recognized as one of the best defenders at his position in the game. He also led the NL in on-base-plus-slugging percentage (1.114) and reached 100 walks for the first time in his career.

Howard mashed 48 home runs with 146 RBI but was doubtless hurt by a .251 batting average and 199 strikeouts. No NL MVP has ever hit below .267.

Pujols’ margin of victory was more decisive than expected, perhaps suggesting a growing appreciation for a player long consigned to Bonds’ shadow and perhaps penalized for never leading his league in home runs or RBI. Still, Pujols has hit .334 and averaged 40 home runs and 122 RBI during his career.

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The biggest disappointment is with The Rhyme. The Rhyme was an Old School hip hop station. It played classic joints from the 80s and 90s, had great shows with Afrika Bambaataa, and great Progressive hip hop music and discussions. They have done away with it and merged it with Sirius’ Hip Hop Nation, which plays “Some Old Skool Rap.” Which means the rest is going to be new crap, which I can’t stand. If it’s not old school or progressive, I will most likely not listen. The good thing about satellite when it launched was the variety of music that could be featured on the stations. The sad thing is, for at least the rap stations, they sound just like a Clear Channel or Channel One stations across the country. The crap at the top of the charts, over and over and over.

I’ve also noticed that the quality of the online stream seems to be lower than usual and it keeps cutting out. The merger isn’t starting out on a good note, in my opinion. One of my favorite channels is gone and the service is sub-par. XM might have just lost a subscriber.

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• US Department of Veterans Affairs
• Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW)
• Veterans History Project (Library of Congress)
• Disabled American Veterans
• Honoring our Veterans (White House)

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I added the applications, music, and podcasts back into iTunes. The problem was knowing what songs were deleted from the iPhone. I add only checked files, but that doesn’t always work (because iTunes sucks). So sometimes I have to add them to a playlist in order for them to sync, even though they are checked to sync. Trying to figure out which ones were in a playlist or already on the iPhone would take forever. That’s when I decided to do a little searching. That’s when I found this post. Basically, what I did was create a smart playlist that included items that I check. As soon as I check an item, it is added to the playlist. If I uncheck, it is deleted. I set up my iPhone to sync that playlist, now every song that I check is synced with my iPhone. It’s the easiest way I’ve found to manually manage the music to sync. So, iTunes breaking and not doing things right made me find a solution that I never knew about that will save me a lot of time. Of course, if iTunes “just worked” I wouldn’t have had to search for a solution in the first place.

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I have a confession to make.

I did not vote for Barack Obama today.

I’ve openly supported Obama since March.  But I didn’t vote for him today.

I wanted to vote for Ronald Woods. He was my algebra teacher at Clark Junior High in East St. Louis, IL.  He died 15 years ago when his truck skidded head-first into a utility pole.  He spent many a day teaching us many things besides the Pythagorean Theorem.  He taught us about Medgar Evers, Ralph Abernathy, John Lewis and many other civil rights figures who get lost in the shadow cast by Martin Luther King, Jr.

But I didn’t vote for Mr. Woods.

I wanted to vote for Willie Mae Cross. She owned and operated Crossroads Preparatory Academy for almost 30 years, educating and empowering thousands of kids before her death in 2003.  I was her first student.  She gave me my first job, teaching chess and math concepts to kids in grades K-4 in her summer program.  She was always there for advice, cheer and consolation.  Ms. Cross, in her own way, taught me more about walking in faith than anyone else I ever knew.

But I didn’t vote for Ms. Cross.

I wanted to vote for Arthur Mells Jackson, Sr. and Jr. Jackson Senior was a Latin professor.  He has a gifted school named for him in my hometown.  Jackson Junior was the pre-eminent physician in my hometown for over 30 years.  He has a heliport named for him at a hospital in my hometown.  They were my great-grandfather and great-uncle, respectively.

But I didn’t vote for Prof. Jackson or Dr. Jackson.

I wanted to vote for A.B. Palmer. She was a leading civil rights figure in Shreveport, Louisiana, where my mother grew up and where I still have dozens of family members.  She was a strong-willed woman who earned the grudging respect of the town’s leaders because she never, ever backed down from anyone and always gave better than she got.  She lived to the ripe old age of 99, and has a community center named for her in Shreveport.

But I didn’t vote for Mrs. Palmer.

I wanted to vote for these people, who did not live to see a day where a Black man would appear on their ballots on a crisp November morning.

In the end, though, I realized that I could not vote for them any more than I could vote for Obama himself.

So who did I vote for?

No one.

I didn’t vote.  Not for President, anyway.

Oh, I went to the voting booth.  I signed, was given my stub, and was walked over to a voting machine.  I cast votes for statewide races and a state referendum on water and sewer improvements.

I stood there, and I thought about all of these people, who influenced my life so greatly.  But I didn’t vote for who would be the 44th President of the United States.

When my ballot was complete, except for the top line, I finally decided who I was going to vote for - and then decided to let him vote for me.  I reached down, picked him up, and told him to find Obama’s name on the screen and touch it.

And so it came to pass that Alexander Reed, age 5, read the voting screen, found the right candidate, touched his name, and actually cast a vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

Oh, the vote will be recorded as mine.  But I didn’t cast it.

Then again, the person who actually pressed the Obama box and the red “vote” button was the person I was really voting for all along.

It made the months of donating, phonebanking, canvassing, door hanger distributing, sign posting, blogging, arguing and persuading so much sweeter.

So, no, I didn’t vote for Barack Obama.  I voted for a boy who now has every reason to believe he, too, can grow up to be anything he wants…even President.

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I was off for a few days last week so I decided to head to the Charter office to exchange boxes myself, still keeping the Wednesday appointment in case the box switch didn’t work. So, now I’m driving out of my way to fix a problem with their equipment myself. Awesome. I get to the office and there is quite a line. Most of the people in front of me are there to complain about billing. The lady that was working was extremely rude to the customers with billing questions. She even told one guy that the previous Charter employee he talked to lied to him! Wow. Nice way to salvage the reputation of your failing company, tell customers that the employees lie to customers. I don’t believe the previous Charter person did lie, because it was about a package that I had seen advertised quite often, yet the lady in the office refused to believe the price and called the customer and other employees liars. I really can’t believe this company. Finally, it’s my turn in line and the lady is just as rude to me as the other customers. I get my box and take it home.

I hook it up and follow the directions on the sheet they gave me to reset the box so it knows what channels to get. I got 3 channels. I call Charter. They send a signal to reset. I still get 3 channels. 2 hours later I call back, the lady sends a signal and tells me I will have to wait until my Wednesday appointment. I tell them this is unacceptable because after going to replace their equipment because they didn’t send one on the technician’s truck before, I deserve someone out that day. She says they can have someone out the next day. I ask to talk to her supervisor so she puts me on hold. She comes back about 10 minutes later and asks for some information, like where the box is, the serial number on the box, etc. She finds out, by asking this, that the new box wasn’t put into the system under our account. So, dubmass bitchy lady at the office didn’t even do her job right. Then again, neither did the first Charter person I talked to. You’d think that would be a standard question they would ask to make sure the equipment is in the system, especially if it’s obvious you’re not getting a signal to your box.

Charter is a completely useless company. Rumor has it they will be filing for bankruptcy soon. As if that’s hard to believe.

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Everyone who visits my site knows that I like to change themes. The lack of quality themes on Habari is one thing that is keeping me from changing. Themes aren’t a make or break deal, but I do like to change things up and not having the ability to do so with a variety of different themes is something that will weigh heavily on my decision. If there was nothing else that made me hesitant about switching, I’d do it. But there are other things.

Lack of widgets or modules built in are something I really want. Because I like to change themes often, not having a widget system for sidebars and whatnot makes things difficult. I like to rearrange the contents of sidebars, footers, etc. without having to edit code. It’s not that I don’t know how to edit the code, it’s just that, these days, I shouldn’t have to.

Lack of documentation makes it hard to do the things I want to do. Back in the pre-widgets WP days this page was my Bible. When editing themes, I still use this page quite often. Habari’s documentation is seriously lacking and it’s difficult to find what it is I need to accomplish certain things. WordPress’s codex spells it out in a great way. This isn’t Habari’s fault, they are young. It took a long time for WordPress’s Codex to get to where it is now. Even a lot of the plugins that are released for Habari have come without clear documentation.

There are also other things that aren’t as big, but I wonder why they aren’t included. For example, Habari uses tags instead of categories. So why isn’t there a template tag to display a tag cloud? You have to use a plugin in order to display it if you want one. I’m sure there are other things like that but I’ve not dealt with it enough to see what they might be. Also, since the codebase is ever changing at this early stage, it takes a lot to keep up with themes and plugins as they are changed quite often and, well, WordPress is much easier to do with the introduction of the automatic plugin upgrading. I can’t tell you when the last time I had to edit a theme because of a WordPress upgrade.

So, there are a few of my reasons why I’m not switching to Habar…. yet. Hopefully, once they mature a little, these things will be introduced and worked on and it will make the transition from WordPress to Habari easier.

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“History shows us where unlimited amounts of money are in political campaigns, it leads to scandal.”

And that, Senator Disgrace McCain, is why I just donated another $50 to the Obama Campaign. I’m sure he thanks you. Please, if you can, donate now.

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When looking at the above image there are many things that awe me. The size of the crowd is the most obvious. I’ve never seen that many people gather in St. Louis. The thing that awes me the most, that I feel a deep down sense of pride and amazement, is the building in the background. That white building with the greenish dome is The Old Court House. It was in that building that over 150 years ago a black man named Dred Scott fought for his right to be a free man. He won his initial freedom, but that was later overturned. Now, 150 years later, the U.S. is seeing its first African-American major party candidate for president. Hopefully this is just the beginning and we will see President Barack Obama. Today was truly a historic day.

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For one of my websites I’ve decided to use my host’s email. Instead of constantly logging in to my host’s webmail system, I decided to set up the account in Thunderbird. I’ve never had anything against Thunderbird, and I think it’s a great app, but like I said, if you’re using something like Gmail, I never saw the point. Well, I’ve been using it for a couple weeks and it’s fine. I don’t get much mail on that account so my opinion is mostly neutral. I have decided to add my Gmail account to Thunderbird to give it a go. One reason for this was because Gmail has been throwing me a lot of errors lately when I try to do something and I wind up having to close the window or tab and open Gmail back up. I won’t need to do that with Thunderbird. The setup is easy and Google provides perfect instructions for optimal integration with Thunderbird. I’m still not sure I see the point. Gmail is just as easy to access via my Gmail notifier or Google Talk, so I don’t save any time. I do kind of miss the threaded view of Gmail, but that’s not a deal breaker for me. Will I stick with it? I’m not sure. I’ll try it for a couple weeks but I have a feeling I’ll be going back to regular Gmail.

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It’s amazing how much blatant racism the Republicans can get away with. I’m not talking about McCain calling Obama “that one.” I honestly don’t think McCain is dumb enough to make a racist remark like that on a live debate (though I do think John McCain is a racist). A group of Republicans in California have made their racism blatant.

The latest newsletter by an Inland Republican women’s group depicts Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama surrounded by a watermelon, ribs and a bucket of fried chicken, prompting outrage in political circles.

The October newsletter by the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated says if Obama is elected his image will appear on food stamps — instead of dollar bills like other presidents. The statement is followed by an illustration of “Obama Bucks” — a phony $10 bill featuring Obama’s face on a donkey’s body, labeled “United States Food Stamps.”

The GOP newsletter, which was sent to about 200 members and associates of the group by e-mail and regular mail last week, is drawing harsh criticism from members of the political group, elected leaders, party officials and others as racist. Continue reading.

Here is the image:

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We could all use a little financial advice during these difficult economic times!

Retirement Plan Investment Tip…
If you had purchased $1000.00 of Nortel stock one year ago, it would now be worth $49.00.
With Enron, you would have $16.50 left of the original $1000.
With WorldCom, you would have less than $5.00 left.
If you had purchased $1000.00 of Delta Air Lines stock you would have $49.00 left.
If you had purchased United Airlines, you would have nothing left.

But, if you had purchased $1000.00 worth of beer one year ago, drank all the beer, then turned in the cans for the aluminum recycling refund you would have $214.00. Based on the above, the best current investment advice is to drink heavily and recycle.

This is called the 401-Keg Plan.

Pure genius.

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