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The New Iphone

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

I find I must weigh in on the new Iphone. The political punditry game is growing stale, considering that everything happening right now is pretty much déjà vu all over again, with the glorious exception of those kids on the street, about which I have had my say. As to what’s left, how many times can you point out that the Republicans are crazy or that we’re being devoured by Wall Street, or that we are attempting to solve our economic problems using time tested nostrums that have failed every other time they’ve been tried.

So, on to the Iphone, which has apparently left a lot of folks cold.

First, I have a confession. While I am a tech fan of the first order, I consider a phone, even the marvelous little Iphone, in the same category as my car. So long as it continues to work, I’ll use it until I run it into the ground. Now, computers, cameras, Ipads, are all different, for reasons I don’t care to articulate because in truth there is no sensible distinction.

Now, back to the Iphone. We can gather from the 4s moniker that a 5 is probably around the corner, but I ask those folks looking for a blockbuster advance on current technology: what more can you reasonably expect, from a hardware standpoint, out of a device small enough to fit in your pocket? As a matter of physics (optics subdivision) the camera on a device as thin as an Iphone can only get so good. You can add all the pixels you want, but after a certain number, they don’t make a difference. After a while, it’s the size of the sensor that counts, and that’s limited by the distance of the lens from the sensor. Display quality is already pretty good, and making it better is probably not going to enrich the user experience very much. Other than near field technology, which may or may not be a good thing, and 4g compatibility, neither of which is that exciting in my book, what was anyone expecting? A different shape, so everyone would have to go out and buy new cases? More storage? No one is really talking about that. The future appears to be in the cloud, and everyone seems to be going in that direction. I’d be for more storage in the Ipad, but in my phone, who cares?

For the most part, future advances are going to be under the hood. Faster processing; faster Wi-Fi, better software, better battery life, etc. That’s where the action is. On those fronts, the new phone delivers quite well, For my own part, I’m more interested in IOS 5 than in Iphone 5. So long as my 3g (or is it 3gs) can run the latest software ( I don’t need a talking digital assistant, so that’s no attraction) I’m fine with it. Most of the changes to the OS were announced months ago, so they’re old news, but that’s where the real improvements will be coming on these devices. I’ve had an Ipad since they first came out. I like my Ipad 2. It’s lighter and thinner, and it has a camera I never use. But the real advance since the device’s first appearance is the evolution in the software as developers learn how to make the device more useful and a possible replacement, in many circumstances, for a regular computer. When I first got my Ipad, I searched for months for blog editing software that would do something as simple as embed a link. Now I have two programs that will do pretty much everything I need. In fact, I haven’t written a post on my computer in months, because my old Mac based blog editor won’t run anymore, and the only replacement I’ve looked at cost $50.00, as opposed to the $4.99 I spent on software for the Ipad.

By the way, for Hitler’s reaction to the new Iphone, go here.

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The Kids Are Alright

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

First they ignored them, and that didn’t work. Then they mocked them, and that didn’t work. Then they arrested them, and that didn’t work. The kids in New York and throughout the country who are following their lead, have the most to lose from the rise of the oligarchs. We oldsters can fade away, a bit more impoverished than we expected, but probably allowed our Social Security crumbs, but the kids will be under their thumbs for the rest of their lives, and their kids, if they can afford to have any, will suffer even more. What’s truly inspiring and encouraging, at least so far, is the absence of any generational rancor, so far as I can detect it. The right has often sought to turn the young against the old, trying to convince them that Social Security, Medicare, etc., are a generational con game. That hasn’t taken hold, except with the Dartmouth Review types. These kids know who’s responsible for the rising inequality and the new normal of high unemployment, low wages and worker oppression. It may be too late to wrest the nation from the grip of the oligarchs. Citizens United may truly have been the last nail, but it’s great to see that they’re trying. If they keep it up the Democrats may have no choice but to try to figure out some way to appease them, and when that day comes lets hope they are as demanding as the teabaggers.

I can’t end this without linking to this piece, written by my younger son, who is involved in urging NYU students to leave their classes and hit the streets. As a parent, I’m a bit worried that he’ll be entrapped by New York’s finest, but I ‘m more proud than anxious.

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Fox reporter gets slammed

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Okay. I’m jealous. Wouldn’t you love to do this good a job if you were interviewed by Fox?

The kids in New York and in other cities seem to be doing it: forcing these issues into the conversation. Now, if only the politicians who call themselves Democrats would tap into this discontent and actually advocate policies to stem the rise of the oligarchs, we might get somewhere.

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Where do these people come from?

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

I know that Newt and his wife have long since become mere caricatures, but I can’t resist piling on. I ask you, of the two entities depicted here, which looks more like it’s not quite real. Barbie looks more lifelike than Callista.

From TPM.

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Want the media’s attention? Stop Making Sense

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Here’s an enlightening video:

And here, to prove the point, is a picture that appears twice in this morning’s New London Day, once as a teaser and once as a half page picture accompanying an article about the protests.

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Obama moves left

Monday, October 3, 2011

So, the Obama campaign is tacking left in order to win the presidential election, after spending the past three years tacking right in pursuit of the White Whale, otherwise known as the mythical homogeneous independent voters.

So, we’ll be hearing a lot about Obama protecting Social Security and Medicare, which is probably good, because it will make him reluctant, at least for now, to return to talk about grand bargains consisting of cutting those programs in order to reward Republican intransigence. We also may be hearing some stuff about Wall Street, if his ratings continue to go South.

I hope it works, considering the alternative, but I question whether the people who have been paying attention will believe a word of it. But then, those people are like me: nowhere to go. This election is about the people who aren’t stupid or political enough to become tea partiers, but are too stupid or inattentive to know what’s being done to them by the corporations and plutocrats running the country. Those people know a few things: they love them some Social Security and Medicare, and they probably don’t like banks. Who knows, Obama may benefit, in a back handed way, from the ludicrous charge that he’s a socialist, since his new found commitment to Social Security, Medicare and tax equity does have a faint, albeit very faint, whiff of Socialism about it. The uniformed may actually believe he’s in character.

It all makes you wonder: where would Obama be in the polls had he stood up for these principles all along? It is impossible to believe he could be lower than he is today had he been constantly making the case that the lower 99 shouldn’t be carrying the burden for the upper 1%. Who knows, maybe he would even have accomplished something had he successfully painted the Republicans as the protectors of the rich that they are. Oh well, better late than never.

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Buffett on class warfare

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Warren Buffett on class warfare:

QUESTIONER: Are you happy seeing your suggestion, this new Buffett Rule, becoming more of a basis of a political battle that really has turned into class warfare?

BUFFETT: Actually, there’s been class warfare going on for the last 20 years, and my class has won. We’re the ones that have gotten our tax rates reduced dramatically.

If you look at the 400 highest taxpayers in the United States in 1992, the first year for figures, they averaged about $40 million of [income] per person. In the most recent year, they were $227 million per person — five for one. During that period, their taxes went down from 29 percent to 21 percent of income. So, if there’s class warfare, the rich class has won.

Buffett’s point is an obvious one, and one that the Democrats, were they really concerned for their alleged constituency, would have been making for the past thirty years. Who knows, maybe Buffett will give the Democrats some cover to start fighting back; maybe those kids in New York will help force the issue into the national conversation, and maybe Obama will take it up as the only way for him to survive politically. For whatever reason, it seems that the floodgates have opened a bit, and maybe the fact that the rich have systematically plundered the rest of us will finally become an issue.

Speaking of those kids in New York, they’ve answered the ginned up criticism that they haven’t articulated their grievances ( funny how no one has demanded coherence from the tea baggers ). Check out their Declaration here.

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The responsible mainstream media

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Before I start this rant, let me say that I appreciate the fact that the New London Day is one of the best, if not the best, newspapers in the state, even now that Ted Mann is gone. But that, unfortunately proves only how low the profession has sunk. In this morning’s paper, a “poll” was reported, giving responses to the following question:

Would you support Michael Buscetto III as a write-in candidate for New London mayor?

There is no direct link to what turns out to be an Internet poll, which I found embedded on the Region section on-line.

I have my opinions on Buscetto, who is mounting an independent bid for mayor after losing the Democratic primary, but they’re irrelevant to this post. What I found amazing about the fact that this was reported in the print edition was that there was no caveat whatsoever to the effect that the poll has no scientific validity whatsoever. It was reported as a poll. Is the Day unaware that readers go to their newspapers for facts, and when a paper reports poll results their is an implied representation that the results being reflect some meaningful reality? There is no way that a poll that anyone can answer, as many times as they like, tells us anything about the actual state of things in New London. It is possible that a scientifically conducted poll would reach results similar to those published in the Day, but if it did one could only chalk it up to coincidence. If such a poll were conducted, I, being a resident of Groton, would not be among those polled, yet I cast a vote on-line without a problem. The Day is certainly free to conduct meaningless on-line polls, if that’s what it takes to up its hit count, but it has an obligation to disclose that the results are meaningless.

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A Double Standard?

Sunday, October 2, 2011

From this morning’s New London Day (via the AP):

Southington state Sen. Joe Markley is asking state auditors to review how the Connecticut Department of Social

Services handled the recent distribution of payments to needy people who sustained losses from Tropical Storm Irene.

The ranking Republican leader of the General Assembly’s Human Services Committee said he wants auditors to investigate claims of fraud. He said news reports indicated that the Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program was poorly handled.

Low-income residents who don’t already receive food stamps were eligible for one-time payments, issued through ATM-style debit card, to cover damages such as spoiled food, loss of income and shelter costs.

Last month, thousands turned up at DSS offices to receive the payments, forming lines that snaked through city neighborhoods. DSS had to deploy reinforcements to their offices.

It’s wondrous how upset Republicans get at the prospect that some poor person might be getting a dollar more in government benefits than they deserve, yet they can’t summon up a bit of moral fervor about the rich sucking us taxpayers dry. How many poor people have to commit this type of alleged fraud to equal the amount of money that the baks have siphoned from us all by a mixture of pure fraud plus greed? At least it has a stimulative effect, while the bankers drove us into recession and are now lecturing us against taking effective action to free ourselves from the mess they created? Where, I wonder, is Markley on all that?

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Friday Night Music

Friday, September 30, 2011

This is dedicated to all those poor misunderstood Wall Streeters presently under attack by the proles in New York:

As you can see here, they’re suffering terribly:

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