Will Fast Food Be The Death Of Us? Yes.
Also read Liquid Candy for more on the soft drink problem. I highly recommend Fast Food Nation although you might not have as many lunch choices after reading it. Having grown up in Orange County California, the history of the fast food moguls was as interesting as what’s wrong with the food.
The family of Charles Bishop released this unfortunate comment:
“Charles and his family have always fully supported our United States war on terrorism and Osama bin Laden.”
Man, language sucks. I know what they meant, but the literal interpretation of those words is that they support the US war on terrorism and they also support Osama bin Laden. Miserable contradiction. That poor family, they will have no opportunity for the complex grief that follows a suicide. Between the FBI, the media and their son killing himself publicly, they must be absolutely overwhelmed.
I’m curious to see what he actually wrote. I doubt it stands up to John Walker, but I’m sure Ann Coulter will have another vitriolic McCarthyist column about how this kid’s upbringing just begged him to join Al Queda. That Ann, always one to comfort a grieving family. Maybe he was confused about why there are so many shades of gray in human behavior. Maybe he didn’t understand why so many people criticize the president privately but no one speaks out publicly. Maybe he just wanted to get back at someone who hurt him emotionally, suicide as the ultimate revenge.
Calling him nuts is just too easy.
If Charles Bishop did leave a note expressing sympathy for bin Laden, this reflects another problem that isn’t being dealt with; a whole lot of people at home and abroad find Osama bin Laden’s anti-US message very compelling. I fear that we’re fighting the battle for hearts and minds with the same strategy that lost the war on drugs.
A lot of people are missing the point of the new iMac. It’s not a computer for pros, it’s a computer for regular users. It’s for the receptionists desk, moms, grandparents, elementary school kids, doctors, lawyers, authors. It’s simple, it doesn’t need fiddling with. Open the box, plug it in and turn it on. I bet at least 40% of all iMacs have never been opened up even to add RAM.
This reminds me of mountain bikers bitching that the Segway could only go 12 mph.
I have a theory that there are two kinds of tech people. Those who always have the newest gadget and fastest computer, and those who hotrod whatever they can get their hands on. I fall into the hotrod category. My main machines are all more than three years old now. Sometimes it sucks, but they’re still getting by and I don’t really have time to move everything to a new machine right now. (Which is a good thing since Apple didn’t announce new pro towers yesterday)
I am shocked and amazed at the monumental stupidity and incompetence of TechTV. They are showing the MacWorld keynote, which started live but then they cut away, said over and over that they were recording it so we wouldn’t miss anything, then ran commercials. Bad commercials.
All TechTV needed to do is what they said they would do, “carry the MacWorld keynote live.” A 10 minute delay might as well be 10 days. I’m reading the live updates on MacMinute and since TechTV is really just an unedited recap.
Better MacWorld hype: Parody Apple hompages. These had me laughing, then they got repetitive. Here are my favorites:
I was hoping to avoid the subject of terrorism for a while, so consider the following links to be stories about normal people who witnessed extraordinary events.
The author of this firsthand account of the attempted shoe-bombing was traveling with his sister and parents. His mother was sitting in the seat directly in front of Richard Reid. On New Years Day the author posted this followup report.
A few days after the flight, The New York Times published this set of photos taken on the plane shortly after the the attempted bomber was restrained.
We heard about the shoe-bomber flight in Utah shortly after we arrived–by plane of course. In September, we flew into Newark the night of the 10th, I was woken the next morning by news of the first World Trade Center attack. I fly a lot.
The increased security at the airports is overwhelmingly pathetic. The people still don’t seem qualified, and searches lasted only until the plane needed to leave the gate for an on-time departure. Any creative third grader could devise a dozen ways around all of it.
Do the soldiers with assault rifles stationed by the metal-detectors make anyone feel more comfortable? How many bodies can a bullet fired from an M-16 go through before it slows down? I have to believe the psychological effect they are trying for would be better effected by qualified, professional people manning the checkpoints.
