Sunday, July 15, 2007

Recommended Viewing

Several friends have recommended that I recommend the discussion from the latest Bill Moyers Journal. One of these friends is one of those guys I'd have bet serious money would be outraged at the segment, which is all about the feasibility and perhaps the necessity of impeaching George W. Bush or, preferably, Bush and Dick Cheney. I don't believe this is ever going to happen but I was impressed with some of the arguments, none of which strike me as real partisan manuevering. You can watch the video online or read a transcript from this page.

Speaking of real partisan manuevering, I'll just say I might disagree with one statement in the conversation. It's when one of the gents says that Tom DeLay wanted to use the impeachment process to remove Bill Clinton as president. Maybe. But it always struck me that those who were driving that movement, and DeLay in particular, knew that they'd never have the votes to convict Clinton. Perhaps they didn't know that early-on and they believed/hoped that a more genuine, significant Impeachable Offense would get uncovered. But at some point when they could still have just reprimanded the guy and gotten on with the nation's business, they decided to go all the way with it because (a) they thought they could embarrass folks like Al Gore who they'd be running against and force them into defending the indefensible and (b) they thought it would make a certain part of the Republican "base" very happy and eager to donate and get out the vote to oust Clinton supporters.

I have a special e-mail address that I use when I have to register on political sites...and it's probably signed up with more Liberal sites than Conservative but it's on both. It gets a ton of mail that says, in effect, "Give us money and we'll fix every problem in the world by destroying the Clintons." It also gets a ton that says, in effect, "Give us money and we'll cure every disease and physical ailment in your body." I think all these messages come from the same place.

• Posted at 11:41 AM · LINK

Computer Stuff

I have several computers — all of the PC variety — and until recently, my two main computers each had one of these hooked up to it. If you don't want to bother clicking, I'll tell you what those are: They're Maxtor OneTouch™ Turbo Edition External Hard Drives. A quick survey of my computer-savvy amigos told me (and still tells me) that they're pretty good units; that while any piece of hardware can fail, the Maxtor Externals are as reliable as anything else even vaguely in that price range. I asked around and kept hearing, "It's very rare that those crash."

Well, not around here, it isn't. I've bought three of them and two have gone kablooey in the last month. One was about two years old but the other lasted a mere four weeks, during most of one of which it was unused because I was outta town. Shortly after my return, it began emitting the blood-curding, sad "Click of Death" that means Trouble Right Here in River City. Both are under warranty so they will be replaced by...the same thing. That isn't as maddening as it might sound because I really don't know of anything better I can buy. I just need to be more conscientious about backups. I lost some things because I got busy and foolishly postponed my own backup routine.

On the first one that failed, there was one clump of files that I really wanted back. They could be replaced but I'd have to do a load of manual work to get them back to the form in which they were last seen. So I took the Maxtor over to a friend/computer consultant who spent many days and charged me a large fee to recover all the data on the hard drive. And he did...but not one of the "recovered" files was readable. What I got back was 750 gb of files that would no longer open. I then purchased File Scavenger, a piece of software which cost a paltry fifty bucks. It's not a complete life saver but it did enable me to recover about 600 gb of files and they were like new and readable. Alas, the most-desired files were in the absent 150.

So I bit the bullet, did all the work and restored the files the hard way and of course, promptly backed them up to a brand-new Maxtor...and that was the second one that failed. Which was annoying but not fatal because I'd also backed them up to DVDs. I have, for obvious reasons, become Backup Crazy. In fact, this message is taking a beastly long time to write because I have to stop every five words and back it all up to disc.

There's not much else to say about this except to remind you (and especially me) that hardware does fail and you need to always be prepared for it. I also wanted to recommend File Scavenger, which could save you beaucoup bucks if and when you have a crash. Don't bother writing me and telling me of your good experiences with this Seagate or that Western Digital. I no longer want to believe that any brand is highly reliable because that'll just make me complacent and lazy about backups. In fact, I'm even going to get the words "if and when" out of my vocabulary on this topic. I'm going to presume there's no "if," just a "when."

• Posted at 11:22 AM · LINK

Today's Video Link

From the 1987 Tony Awards and from the musical, Me and My Girl, here's Robert Lindsay leading the troupe in the infectious number, "The Lambeth Walk."

You can't see him very well but the tall, dignified gent in the tux near the center of the stage in some shots is George S. Irving, a longtime Broadway actor — he's 85 and still performing — whose voice could be heard on about half the cartoon shows that were produced in New York in the sixties. He was the narrator on the Underdog show and he did those Twinkles commercials (like this one). But don't spend a lot of time looking for him. Just enjoy this fine piece of theatrical merriment...

• Posted at 10:21 AM · LINK

Recommended Reading

Frank Luntz on what it will take for a Republican to win the White House in 2008. He judiciously omits the topic that few will speak in public: What will happen if there's another big terrorist attack before Election Day. Under normal circumstances, that would further lower the public's faith in Bush and those who've supported him...but who knows? We can only hope we don't find out.

• Posted at 9:35 AM · LINK

True Colors

As some of you may recall, since my surgery, a small but significant concern for me has been what to drink. I've never liked coffee or tea or iced tea. I neither like nor trust artificial sweeteners. I need to avoid things that are as heavy in sugar content as most fruit juices. And I have to avoid carbonation.

What does this leave? Not a whole heckuva lot. I drink a lot of tomato juice and I also mix a watery lemonade using Country Time Lemonade mix and bottled lemon juice, and a watery orange drink using a Knudsen sports drink called Orange Recharge which they sell at some (not all) Whole Foods Markets. Those three things and water are about it. I drink an awful lot of water.

More for the change of pace than any other reason, I often vary the water with the flavoring of either True Lemon, True Lime or True Orange — especially the last of these, which is a fairly new product that is just appearing in a few marketplaces. Each is a crystallized citrus powder that contains all natural ingredients and no sugar or calories. They're especially handy to have along in restaurants where the H2O may be of dubious taste and a wedge of real fruit may not be easily obtainable. In some cases, I'm almost ashamed to admit, I like these better than the squeezings of the genuine article.

You can read all about 'em over at the True Lemon website and you can also arrange for them to send you some free samples. I do not own stock in this company. I just like their products.

• Posted at 9:01 AM · LINK