Digital Dreams
Hi. I still use LJ, follow my friends and similar, but I've moved my main host to Dreamwidth now, and am crossposting everything to here, but asking people to comment there.
Mat Bowles.
It's still fully interoperative, the OpenID comment functions there are good and improving, and I can follow everything from both sites easily.
Mat Bowles.
It's still fully interoperative, the OpenID comment functions there are good and improving, and I can follow everything from both sites easily.
Have I mentioned how cool it is to have a US President who feels like one of us? IT literate, a bit geeky, smart, likes a good debate, enjoys being challenged on ideas, etc. It's cool, isn't it? Thing is? He's just another political leader. Who am I talking about here:
Yup, you're right. It's Tony Blair. And Barack Obama. Worse? Watch this ((via):
( Comedy Central's The Daily Show video with Jon Stewart covering the inauguration )
Scary, innit? Reminded me of something though. From a few years back, while Blair was still in office, while Cameron was still trying to build his 'brand'. I know, I know, he's still trying to build his brand, but still:
( YouTube video of Armando Ianucci's Time Trumpet comparing Blair to Cameron )
President Obama sir? I really hope I'm wrong on this one. Please don't turn into another Tony Blair.
Relatively obscure politician with a legal background, went to an expensive school and a top university, came out of nowhere while in opposition, good line in rhetoric and appealing to a broad church, very capable and intelligent wife, young family, wins on a landslide with the wishes of the nation having mobilised a massive national effort seeing record membership for his party. Promising change.
Yup, you're right. It's Tony Blair. And Barack Obama. Worse? Watch this ((via):
( Comedy Central's The Daily Show video with Jon Stewart covering the inauguration )
Scary, innit? Reminded me of something though. From a few years back, while Blair was still in office, while Cameron was still trying to build his 'brand'. I know, I know, he's still trying to build his brand, but still:
( YouTube video of Armando Ianucci's Time Trumpet comparing Blair to Cameron )
President Obama sir? I really hope I'm wrong on this one. Please don't turn into another Tony Blair.
I'm awake, honest. I've had enough coffee to get me going again anyway. Doing some tidying up to my LJ, renaming tags, etc. This seems like a good enough reason to rename one of them, plus 2008 has ended so it's time to start a new 'life' tag for this year.
Appears I've posted less about what's been going on in my life this year than any other calender year that I've had the LJ. I guess being happy gives me less to write about, right? Completely skint, but there y'go, can't have everything.
I don't do new years resolutions, and, well, predictions are a bit of a mugs game, but, well, might as well.
( UK: politics will dominate, likely election, bit of history explaining why )
( Obama's honeymoon, potential pitfalls, hope he holds it together )
( Europe, Referenda, Libertas and elections )
Meh, 7pm. Time to go pick the Shrub up from her Dad's.
Appears I've posted less about what's been going on in my life this year than any other calender year that I've had the LJ. I guess being happy gives me less to write about, right? Completely skint, but there y'go, can't have everything.
I don't do new years resolutions, and, well, predictions are a bit of a mugs game, but, well, might as well.
( UK: politics will dominate, likely election, bit of history explaining why )
( Obama's honeymoon, potential pitfalls, hope he holds it together )
( Europe, Referenda, Libertas and elections )
Meh, 7pm. Time to go pick the Shrub up from her Dad's.
I always like reading Mr Steel--I don't always agree with him (y'know, trot and all) but he is damn funny. In an article about Obama's triangulation exercise:
when Obama meets Gordon Brown next week it's going to make Brown feel even worse. Maybe Obama will advise him "Gordon, you need to come up with a snappy three-word slogan that sums up your demeanour, the way I did with 'Yes we can'." And as a result the Labour Party's slogan for the next election will be "Where am I?"Sounds about right for the moment. Or in the aftermath, regarding their MPs--"where'd they go?"...
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Time's analysis of the Clinton campaign failures. Personally, I always thought Barack was a better candidate, but for her cheif strategist to not actually understand how delegates are won? Gah! You can't win if you don't know the rules
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Dubbya's coming to visit. D'you fancy being annoying? I most certainly do. Nice little button in my sidebar coming right up...
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Meant to link this yesterday, but as every other bugger has done it already I thought I might as well. Mark in 'state the obvious' shockâ”for a filthy Stopper trot he's quite switched on really.
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I think Chris is right here, but not 100% sure, opinions? 'Conventional economics - which is distinct from plundering capitalism - can be the ally of environmentalists, not its opponent.'
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10 reasons why Obama won from the BBC's US correspondent, they look about right to me. Point 10 is especially good, although I've not seen that series yet
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A character based on a real person wins a TV election campaign, the real person borrows from the character and wins a real election campaign. Circularity headache time?
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A nice little summary of the history of Mozilla and Firefox, complete with nifty poster of the browser wars, found it in an old folder of links
Odds are good if you're reading my journal you're at least paying a little bit of attention to the US election campaigns currently still going. Not least because at the end of it all, the person elected gets control of enough nukes to blow up the world a few times, which is rarely the case in a foreign election. It's, um, a bit of a mess, n'est ce pas?
For those that don't normally pay much attention, the US candidate selection Primary system is usually over by now. Usually. Normally both sides have got a clear front runner and the others pull out in the name of "party unity". This year? No chance, both parties remain too close to call. The drawback of personality politics and directly elected executives, you can't just elect a local MP, you need a candidate your party is happy with. And if you have a country the size of a continent and 6 times more people than Britain, that takes just a little bit more time. So, y'know, I thought it was time to
( The Republican nomination race )
( The Democrat nomination race )
Yes, we can...
For those that don't normally pay much attention, the US candidate selection Primary system is usually over by now. Usually. Normally both sides have got a clear front runner and the others pull out in the name of "party unity". This year? No chance, both parties remain too close to call. The drawback of personality politics and directly elected executives, you can't just elect a local MP, you need a candidate your party is happy with. And if you have a country the size of a continent and 6 times more people than Britain, that takes just a little bit more time. So, y'know, I thought it was time to
- put on my psephologists head and
- laugh at the stupidity of the BBC pundits who're getting so much wrong.
( The Republican nomination race )
( The Democrat nomination race )
Summary
In the Republican race, the Christian/conservative vote was split, giving McCain a false lead, now that Romney has withdrawn they might just select a lunatic with no chance, which would be good. In the Democratic race, it's too close to call, and while Hillary may be a perfectly good Democrat, she's not my type of democrat, and she could lose to the non-lunatic that the Republicans may still elect. Obama is ahead, and gaining momentum, but the situation could change. Can we hope it won't?Yes, we can...
Things that make Mat happy part mcmxvii. Via just about everyone (including an email), HBO, the US TV channel that made
grrm's A Song of Ice and Fire into a very long TV show. It gets better:
And, in US news, Senator Barack Obama:
Right, I'm off into town for the protest I mentioned, see you all on the flip side...
The Sopranos, Sex and the City, Six Feet Under, Oz, Carnivàle, The Larry Sanders Show, Deadwood, Band of Brothers, Rome...(and snipping out shows I didn't like/haven't seen still leaves an impressive list there) have announced that they will be making
The author will co-exec produce the seriesand each book will be an entire season, so while they'll need to cut out some detail, they won't need to cut out all the detail. In a different article on the same story I also found:
This comes on the heels of HBO announcing they would do a series based on PreacherLemme hear you say an amen. Game of Thrones and Preacher? Yowsers.
And, in US news, Senator Barack Obama:
I'll be filing papers today to create a presidential exploratory committee. For the next several weeks, I am going to talk with people from around the country, listening and learning more about the challenges we face as a nation, the opportunities that lie before us, and the role that a presidential campaign might play in bringing our country together.I first heard about this guy when Evan linked to a video of his address to the DNC at the time Kerry/Edwards won the nomination, and I was actually impressed. It's not often these days that public speaking and speeches impress me, but this guy did. I've only heard good things since. I'm thinking he won't win the nomination, but will make a great VP candidate behind either Edwards or Clinton.
Right, I'm off into town for the protest I mentioned, see you all on the flip side...


