Kubuntu Stuff

Penguin Liberation Front:
PLF & win32 codecs
PLF Main Site

Fix Konqueror Menus:
Kubuntu FAQ
Kubuntu Breezy comes with a simplified Konqueror profile to make things more use friendly compared to default KDE.
To get back to the default KDE profiles:
sudo rm -r /usr/share/kubuntu-default-settings/kde-profile/default/share/apps/konqueror
sudo cp /usr/share/apps/konqueror/konqueror-orig.rc /usr/share/apps/konqueror/konqueror.rc
Still a bit unclear as to how the default Kubuntu menus are actually less confusing and easier to use...

nvidia
$ sudo apt-get install nvidia-glx nvidia-settings
$ sudo nvidia-glx-config enable
Then...$ sudo vi /etc/X11/xorg.conf and comment (#) out the lines "Load GLCore" and "Load dri". Logout of KDE, CTRL+ALT+BKSP. See pretty nvidia logo screen. Play DooM.

SlashPink!

Ok.

This is definately one of the better slashdot April Fool's gags.

Preserved here for posterity.

Don't Belive Everything You Read in the NYTImes

So first, Dan Rather and Mary Mapes give us the fake Bush National Guard memos.
Now, in an article by titled "Judges on Secretive Panel Speak Out on Spy Program", the New York Times provides this little snippet (emphasis added):
Five former judges on the nation's most secretive court...urged Congress on Tuesday to give the court a formal role in overseeing the [NSA] surveillance program.
In a rare glimpse into the inner workings of the secretive court, known as the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, several former judges who served on the panel also voiced skepticism at a Senate hearing about the president's constitutional authority to order wiretapping on Americans without a court order. They also suggested that the program could imperil criminal prosecutions that grew out of the wiretaps.

However, reading the transcripts, it is clear that the FISA court judges raised anything but skepticism over the NSA program.
A few snippits from the hearing (emphasis added):

• Judge Kornblum: As you know, in Article I, Section 8, Congress has enumerated powers as well as the power to legislate all enactments necessary and proper to their specific authorities, and I believe that is what the President has, similar authority to take executive action necessary and proper to carry out his enumerated responsibilities of which today we are only talking about surveillance of Americans.


• Judge Kornblum (asked whether a law can infringe (or limit, change, etc) a President's Constitutional powers): I think--as a Magistrate Judge, not a District Judge, that a President would be remiss in exercising his Constitutional authority to say that, "I surrender all of my power to a statute," and, frankly, I doubt that Congress, in a statute, can take away the President's authority, not his inherent authority, but his necessary and proper authority.


• Judge Stafford (same question): Everyone is bound by the law, but I do not believe, with all due respect, that even an act of Congress can limit the President's power under the Necessary and Proper Clause under the Constitution.
  
• From (one of) Our moronic Senators from Illinois (Durbin AKA Turbin Durbin):
  
  Senator Durbin: Well, as we have heard it described--and I have not been briefed either, there are only a few Senators who have--it is the interception of domestic communications between people in the United States and those in foreign lands, and that strikes me as falling within the four corners of the FISA law as written.
  
  Judge Keenan: But you use the word in your introductory question and in that question, "domestic," and as I understand from the lay press, again, this is international, it is not domestic. So that's why I'm not in a position to answer, sir. (Ed: In other words, you blowhard, it is NOT a DOMESTIC SPYING PROGRAM! You even said so yourself: "between people in the United States and those in foreign lands." Sheesh.)
  
  Judge Baker: Senator, did the statute limit the President? You created a balance between them [in the FISA statute], and I don't think it took away the inherent authority that Judge Kornblum talked about.


• And on the admissibility of information in a court of law:
  
  Judge Kornblum: To be admissible, the evidence would have had to have been lawfully seized or lawfully obtained and the standard that the district judge would use is that, depending upon where this is, is the law in his circuit. In most of the circuits, the law is clear that the President has the authority to do warrantless surveillance if it is to collect foreign intelligence and it is targeting foreign powers or agents. If the facts support that, then the district judge could make that finding and admit the evidence, just as they did in Truong-Humphrey.

Well, seems to me from the transcripts, that the judges actually, for the most part, presented a case that the NSA program is entirely legal. Not even close to what the NYT reported.

Links:
Powerline
Powerline
Powerline
The New York Times
Hearing Transcript

The internet is now officially providing better, more accurate news than the Old Media.
And they wonder why circulation numbers are dropping.

SUV Terrorist

Random thought:
Shouldn't the media and Democrats be playing up this guy who drove his SUV into a bunch of people in the name of Allah? After all, here is a case of a terrorist attack on US soil! Bush didn't protect us! What good are the Patriot Act and the NSA if Bush still can't protect us?!

AllPeers: The Firefox Killer Ap

Now this is just plain cool.

AllPeers

Basically, it's a Firefox extension that allows you to share files with "Buddy List." ie: Set up family members as peers, and then select pictures, etc to share with them.

Kinda like a mini-private-Napster+.

On a somewhat related note, Flock certainly has some interesting potentials as well.

"Secret" Searches

I've see this other places as well, but here's a nice writeup from drudge on Clinton's and Carter's orders to search & observe Americans without a court order:
CLINTON ADMINISTRATION SECRET SEARCH ON AMERICANS -- WITHOUT COURT ORDER

CARTER EXECUTIVE ORDER: 'ELECTRONIC SURVEILLANCE' WITHOUT COURT ORDER

Bill Clinton Signed Executive Order that allowed Attorney General to do searches without court approval

Clinton, February 9, 1995: "The Attorney General is authorized to approve physical searches, without a court order"

Jimmy Carter Signed Executive Order on May 23, 1979: "Attorney General is authorized to approve electronic surveillance to acquire foreign intelligence information without a court order."

WASH POST, July 15, 1994: Extend not only to searches of the homes of U.S. citizens but also -- in the delicate words of a Justice Department official -- to "places where you wouldn't find or would be unlikely to find information involving a U.S. citizen... would allow the government to use classified electronic surveillance techniques, such as infrared sensors to observe people inside their homes, without a court order."

Deputy Attorney General Jamie S. Gorelick, the Clinton administration believes the president "has inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches for foreign intelligence purposes."

Secret searches and wiretaps of Aldrich Ames's office and home in June and October 1993, both without a federal warrant.
==============
Not to mention Carnivore and Echeleon, which largely started under Clinton.

Munich

Obviously not having see the movie yet, this is still an interesting read, for some history if not the movie review:
http://americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=5085

Exerpts:
In real history, there is an enemy. The enemy is Islamic Jihad, although sometimes Jihad is called Militant Islam or Islamofascism. Jihad is a permanent war. This means Jihad excludes the idea of peace, but allows for truces (hudnas) to regroup, infiltrate, and attack again.
=====
Jihad—like fascism and totalitarianism - destroys the moral order of humanity.
=====
November 28, 1941, when Hitler made a pact with the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem – the grandfather of the PLO – to effect The Final Solution-the extermination of all Jews from the face of the earth.
=====
[T]he Grand Mufti had declared Jihad on the Allied Powers...on November 25, 1941, and the United States of America was attacked two weeks later

Dems a bit unclear on the concept of "democracy"

Here's a nice quote from Democrat Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid:
"We've become like the House of Commons. Whoever has the most votes wins. It hasn't worked that way in 216 years," he said.

Uh, Mr. Reid, sorry to break it to you, but that's what democracy is.

Hattip: PowerlineBlog
The Washington Times

Happy Aids Day!

Marine Out Eight Bucks; Bush To Blame-Film at 11

On the lack of positive news out of Iraq:
National Review

The Marines "felt that it's not that the negative stories - like casualty reports - shouldn't be reported, but that we never hear what America is getting for this sacrifice. As one Marine put it, it's like if I spent $7.99 for a slice of pizza and the headlines the next day read, "Marine Out Eight Bucks!""

Cowards Cut and Run; Marines Never Do

'Nuff said.

Collusion between Sony and Anti-VIrus Vendors

Sony is now releasing CDs that install a root-kit (root-kit==bad) on MSWindows boxes. It has come to light that this root-kit gets by AV and Spyware scanners because Sony worked closely with AV vendors to ensure that their root-kit would not be tagged as spyware.

Symantec and MicroSoft are among those who allowed Sony to own your computer.

Full story is here:
http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20051113164717817

Good commentary here:
http://lobby4linux.com/modules/weblog/details.php?blog_id=19
"If after reading this, you do not immediately investigate at least the possibility of switching to Linux (or Mac), you are hopeless. You either work for one of these companies or your belly is so bloated with their Kool-aid that you are permenantly poisoned."

I would say switch to Linux, as Apple still keeps a lot of their code secret, and they themselves are a big proponent of Digital Restriction Management (DRM).

Switch.

Now.

Dems Lie About Saddam-Terror Connection

From the 1998 Clinton indictment of bin Laden, Count 4:
Al Qaeda also forged alliances with the National Islamic Front in the Sudan and with the government of Iran and its associated terrorist group Hezballah for the purpose of working together against their perceived common enemies in the West, particularly the United States. In addition, al Qaeda reached an understanding with the government of Iraq that al Qaeda would not work against that government and that on particular projects, specifically including weapons development, al Qaeda would work cooperatively with the Government of Iraq.

From Powerline Blog

The Complete Military History of France

A short history of France (from the Don & Roma page at WLS.
- Gallic Wars: Lost. In a war whose ending foreshadows the next 2000 years of French history, France is conquered by of all things, an Italian.
- Hundred Years' War: Mostly lost, saved at last by female schizophrenic who inadvertently creates The First Rule of French Warfare; "France's armies are victorious only when not led by a Frenchman."
- Italian Wars: Lost. France becomes the first and only country to ever lose two wars when fighting Italians.
- Wars of religion: France goes 0-5-4 against the Huguenots
- Thirty Years War - France is technically not a participant, but manages to get invaded anyway. Claims a tie on the basis that eventually the other participants started ignoring her.
- War of Devolution: Tied. Frenchmen take to wearing red flowerpots as chapeaux.
- The Dutch War: Tied
- War of the Augsburg League/King William's War/French and Indian War - Lost, but claimed as a tie. Three ties in a row induces deluded Frogophiles the world over to label the period as the height of French military power.
- War of the Spanish Succession: Lost. The War also gave the French their first taste of a Marlborough, which they have loved every since.
- American Revolution: In a move that will become quite familiar to future Americans, France claims a win even though the English colonists saw far more action. This is later known as "de Gaulle Syndrome", and leads to the Second Rule of French Warfare; "France only wins when America does most of the fighting."
- French Revolution: Won, primarily due the fact that the opponent was also French.
- The Napoleonic Wars: Lost. Temporary victories (remember the First Rule!) due to leadership of a Corsican, who ended up being no match for a British footwear designer.
- The Franco-Prussian War: Lost. Germany first plays the role of drunken Frat boy to France's ugly girl home alone on a Saturday night.
- World War I: Tied and on the way to losing, France is saved by the United States. Thousands of French women find out what it's like to not only sleep with a winner, but one who doesn't call her "Fraulein."
Sadly, widespread use of condoms by American forces forestalls any improvement in the French bloodline.
- World War II: Lost. Conquered French liberated by the United States and Britain just as they finish learning the Horst Wessel Song.
- War in Indochina: Lost. French forces plead sickness; take to bed with the Dien Bien Flu
- Algerian Rebellion - Lost. Loss marks the first defeat of a western army by a Non-Turkic Muslim force since the Crusades, and produces the First Rule of Muslim Warfare; "We can always beat the French." This rule is identical to the First Rules of the Italians, Russians, Germans, English, Dutch, Spanish, Vietnamese and Esquimaux.
- War on Terrorism - France, keeping in mind its recent history, surrenders to Germans and Muslims just to be safe. Attempts to surrender to Vietnamese ambassador fail after he takes refuge in a McDonald's.

Let's face it. When it comes to war, France gets rolled more often than a Parisian prostitute with a visible mustache. They've been beaten so many times there's no fight left in them.
The question for any country silly enough to count on the French should not be "Can we count on the French?", but rather "How long until France collapses?"

But never fear - The French are always there when they need us!

Theodore Roosevelt on being an American

Theodore Roosevelt on Immigrants and being an American

"In the first place, we should insist that if the immigrant who comes here in good faith becomes an American and assimilates himself to us, he shall be treated on an exact equality with everyone else, for it is an outrage to discriminate against any such man because of creed, or birthplace, or origin. But, this is predicated upon the man's becoming in very fact an American, and nothing but an American. There can be no divided allegiance here. Any man who says he is an American, but something else also, isn't an American at all. We have room for but one flag, the American flag ... and this excludes the red flag, which symbolizes all wars against liberty and civilization, just as much as it excludes any foreign flag of a nation to which we are hostile. We have room for but one language here, and that is the English language. And we have room for but one sole loyalty, and that is a loyalty to the American people."

Theodore Roosevelt 1907

Libs vs Jordanian Responce to Terror Attacks

So the USA and Jordan have each had their own 9/11. Ours was 9/11/2001, and Jordanians are comparing that to the recent hotel bombings there.

Let's look at the difference in the reactions:
American Liberals: Blame America. Blame George Bush. Try and determine why these Arabs hate us so much. Call for a greater understanding of Islam, hoping that we can all just get along.

Jordanians Repsonse: Al-Zarqawi: Burn in hell you mother-fscker.

I like the Jordanian reponse.

Killing Dr King again

Compare and contrast time:
Dr. King:
I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.
Democrats Today:
Black Democratic leaders in Maryland say that racially tinged attacks against Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele in his bid for the U.S. Senate are fair because he is a conservative Republican.

Such attacks include throwing Oreo's at him during campaign appearances, and calling him "Uncle Tom." Also see the "Simple Sambo" post below.

Steele is black. The first black man to win a statewide election in Maryland.

Hat tip to the Malcontent

For the White Sox Fans

Five Chicago sports fans were climbing a mountain one
day. Each was a fan of a different Chicago team and
each proclaimed to be the most loyal of all fans to
their team.

Finally as they reached the top, the Blackhawk fan
hurled himself off the mountain, shouting, "This is
for Bobby Hull and all the great Blackhawks who
played in Chicago!!!" as he fell to his doom. Not wanting
to be outdone, the Bulls fan threw himself off the
mountain, proclaiming, "This is for Michael Jordan and the
great teams of the 90's!!!" Seeing this, the Bears fan walked over
and shouted, "This is for DITKA!!!", and leapt to
his death.

The two remaining fans just looked at each other in
stunned silence. After a minute, the Sox Fan shouted,
"This is for everyone on the South Side!!!" and pushed
the Cubs fan off of the mountain.

Dem's racism shines thru yet again

From Drudge: http://www.drudgereport.com/flash9ia.htm

National Italian American Foundation Demands "Scalito" Apology
Mon Oct 31 2005 15:56:42 ET

National Italian American Foundation (NIAF) Statement:

The NIAF is distressed by the attempts of some senators and the media (CNN, CBS) to marginalize Judge Samuel Alito's outstanding record, by frequent reference to his Italian heritage and by the use of the nickname, "Scalito."

Appropriately, no one mentioned that Justice Breyer was Jewish or
suggested that he was lock-step ideologically with the other Jewish
Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, it would have been
outrageous to do so. We still do not know Justice Robert's ethnicity.

We are justly proud of Justice Alito's Italian heritage and his sterling academic and judicial records as well as his impeccable integrity. However, he should be considered as an individual. In honor of the memory of the just departed Rosa Parks the Senate champions of civil rights should insist that Judge Alito be considered only on his extraordinary merits.

Sincerely,
A. Kenneth Ciongoli
Chairman of the National Italian American Foundation


'Nuff said.

What if a conservative did this?

http://stevegilliard.blogspot.com/2005/10/simple-sambo-wants-to-move-to-big.html

So, like, what would happen, do you think, if Rush Limbaugh referred to Jessie Jackson as "Simple Sambo"?

Just asking.

UPDATE: Well, unfortunately the coward changed the picture. It was a lovely little "blackface" type picture. But the new caption should be bad enough: "I's Simple Sambo and I's running for the Big House"