September 2008 Archive

Watching the debate has been a roller coaster ride for me - both from being outside of the country and seeing how people are responding to the election and the financial crisis. But the thing that has been the scariest has been watching the tactics of the two campaigns and seeing which is winning out in the press.

My $0.02 of tonights debate

Watching this - I saw in the first third of the debate a candidate who looked like a deer caught in the headlights - bobbing and weaving on the issues of the financial crisis. With more stories of past experiences and no substance, McCain has to ride out the conversation topics since his gambit on “suspending the campaign” did not work out. And, it seems as though his debate prep consisted of two things - ride through the financial crisis with various stories and do not look at Obama.

Obama, on the other hand, seemed to be focusing on the concept of being the Presidential statesman - the person who will rise above the double-talk rhetoric and to establish himself as the more “presidential”. I keep thinking that his answers could benefit from the training that Biden is getting - less rhetoric and more meat and KISS (keep it simple).

For the most part, the economic part of this debate was Obama’s to win, and McCain scampered through it.
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Watching the debate on BBS (no commentary, what a great way of listening) while in Bangkok, Thailand:
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After waking up on the other side of the world, I find myself astonished at the insanity that is overtaking the election - especially with McCain’s fear of speaking in public.

This is an election that will determine our future - especially in a world where leadership needs to step up. McCain’s choice to delay/avoid is a political play, which I can understand from the political game, but not when we - as Americans - need true leadership.

Joint Statement of Senator Barack Obama and Senator John McCain

“The American people are facing a moment of economic crisis. No matter how this began, we all have a responsibility to work through it and restore confidence in our economy. The jobs, savings, and prosperity of the American people are at stake.

Now is a time to come together – Democrats and Republicans – in a spirit of cooperation for the sake of the American people. The plan that has been submitted to Congress by the Bush Administration is flawed, but the effort to protect the American economy must not fail.

This is a time to rise above politics for the good of the country. We cannot risk an economic catastrophe. Now is our chance to come together to prove that Washington is once again capable of leading this country.”

Speaking for himself, Senator Obama outlined the following principles that he calls on Senator McCain to support:

I believe that several core principles should guide this legislation.

First, there must be oversight. We should not hand over a blank check to the discretion of one man. We support an independent, bipartisan board to ensure accountability and complete transparency.

Second, we need to protect taxpayers. There should be a path for taxpayers to recover their money, and to turn a profit if Wall Street prospers.

Third, no Wall Street executive should profit from taxpayer dollars. This plan cannot be a welfare program for CEOs whose greed and irresponsibility has contributed to this crisis.

Fourth, we must help families who are struggling to stay in their homes. We cannot bail out Wall Street without helping millions of families facing foreclosure on Main Street.

Fifth, we both agree that this financial rescue package should move on its own without any earmarks or other measures. We have different views about the need for other action, but this must be a clean bill.

This is a time to rise above politics for the good of the country. We cannot risk an economic catastrophe. This is not a Democratic problem or a Republican problem – this is an American problem. Now, we must find an American solution.

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While this may sound silly, after a couple of conversations today with friends in the tech community who are relatively close to the Obama Campaign, let me say that from the reports and whispers I hear - the team has done a lot more than simply put together a DeanSpace 2.0.

I can not speak directly on what I have learned - let me say simply: with a team like Obama’s and the vision that they are executing on - I am extremely excited to see what happens 40+ days from now. But, it all rests on our getting out the vote.

Have you registered to vote?

For the past four days (and months before), I have said to many friends that the issues that would dominate this years election would be the economy - and at times, I considered some alternatives to who would be my choice for President this coming election. In the beginning - I was not sure on all - I was looking at more economic wonks like Mitt Romney (okay, so he’s a Repug - I still looked at him and his suggestions), and Mike Bloomberg (yes, Mayor Mike who had breakfast with Obama at a NY deli a while back) and began to feel more confident about Obama - not because of his strong economic background, but because he seemed to b another learned man who could effectively think and lead us through the crisis that we were heading toward.

And now, four days since the start of this financial crisis, I am holding out hope for Obama and the future of our country. I am tired of the failed economic and energy policies that has been put in place the past seven years.

I still remember the anger I felt when I read about those private meetings in the VP’s office on a n energy policy that was drafted by beneficiaries of the oil company largess (e.g. Ken Lay).

I still remember the utter frustration I felt when I watched our great country convince itself to prepare for war in a country that could not have attacked us - and let the antagonist of our financial stresses get away in Afghanistan - just so we could capture him at an appropriately “good” time.

I still remember talking with friends of mine in London warning me to get out of the stocks and anything dealing with real estate since the US had been acting more like a third-world nation with its financial structure - and that if we had a name like Argentina, we would have our Moodys rating drop to “junk” status.

And I still remember the dream of being the most powerful nation in the world, a “hyperppower” in the New American Century as the Repug neoCons called it. It called for military projection into other areas, and little focus on our countries infrastructure and strength beyond our soldiers for fodder in the grand powerplays.
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From a mailing list I am on:

Apologies for the broad email, but Uday Sreekanth, the Deputy CTO/Data Architect for the campaign, mentioned to me the campaign is in need of an experienced DBA to augment their efforts.

Here is the job description below from Uday:

The Obama for America campaign has an immediate need for an experienced DBA to manage our data analytics and targeting, managed in a MySQL database. A majority of the work will be centered around importing data frequently from external vendors, and writing, monitoring and optimizing scripts that
transform the imported data. Fluency with SQL and scripting is a must, and experience with MySQL is preferred. Most importantly, this person must be able to start working in downtown Chicago right away, as we have just a short amount of time to election day!

• Campaign will assist in finding (free) supporter housing
• US citizens and permanent residents only

If you have any candidates, please have them contact Uday Sreekanth at Uday [at] barackobama.com.

Okay, so maybe this is funny - may it is not. But way too much fun for me to not add to this blog:

I have been watching this recent issue unfold with a bit of incredulity - especially when you watch the video of what the “Palin Truth Squad” is crying about:

When I went to YouTube to see what the other side was doing, they artfully removed the leading content - and trimmed it down for others to make an assumption, based on showing the Hockey Mom/Pit Bull comment from her speech to actually set the premise of the “outrage” fostered by the McCain camp.

And then, I saw Andrew Sullivan’s post today.  In it, he expresses much of my own thoughts, in a very artful manner. There is a disappointment I feel in McCain and his actions - or rather, his inaction in this, his last major campaign for his career. What surprises me is how he is trading his legacy for the potential win:

Yes, McCain made a decision that revealed many appalling things about him. In the end, his final concern is not national security. No one who cares about national security would pick as vice-president someone who knows nothing about it as his replacement. No one who cares about this country’s safety would gamble the security of the world on a total unknown because she polled well with the Christianist base. No person who truly believed that the surge was integral to this country’s national security would pick as his veep candidate a woman who, so far as we can tell anything, opposed it at the time.

McCain has demonstrated in the last two months that he does not have the character to be president of the United States. And that is why it is more important than ever to ensure that Barack Obama is the next president. The alternative is now unthinkable. And McCain - no one else - has proved it.

I have enjoyed watching McCain over the years - even appreciated his blunders on the Daily Show and appreciate that he is a POW.  But when a man decided to follow the baser instincts of his advisers because it is more important to win via vitriol rather than on the benefit of your own plans, that is not a man I wish to see as President.

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Doing my part for the Internet ecosystem:

From Susan Crawford with OneWebDay:

OneWebDay is an Earth Day for the internet.  The idea behind OneWebDay is to focus attention on a key internet value (this year, online participation in democracy), focus attention on local internet concerns (connectivity, censorship, individual skills), and create a global constituency that cares about protecting and defending the internet.

The Internet is under enormous pressure in this country, as it is around the world.

Here are some examples:  Access providers want to track what everyone is doing online and use it for their commercial advantage.  They’re developing prioritization technology that will be like a cellphone layer on the internet - able to bill differently for different uses.  They’re working closely with law enforcement and Hollywood in ways that will make internet use unpredictable and heavily-surveilled.  The greatest engine of free speech and democratic outreach the world has ever seen is being co-opted by telephone companies.  This isn’t good for our future.

At the same time, we’re suffering from enormous digital divides.  Lower-income and rural communities don’t have adequate connectivity.  Senior citizens and minorities are often left out.  Skills are inadequate, and there is a lot of fear of the Internet.

OneWebDay is an environmental movement for the Internet ecosystem.  It’s a platform for people to educate and activate others about important issues for the Internet’s future. It’s happening all over the world.

Here in the US, key figures involved include Tim Westergren (Pandora) and Larry Lessig, speaking in NYC; the Future of Music campaign and Rock the Net, in Chicago; the Berkman Center at Harvard; a host of public interest groups in Washington; the City of San Francisco (using OWD to install tech centers in low-income housing using refurbished City computers); Doc Searls, Craig Newmark, David Weinberger, Mary Hodder, Craig Newmark, Jimmy Wales, Joichi Ito, Jerry Michalski, Deb Schultz, and a huge host of volunteers.

See more OneWebDay stories at: http://onewebday.org/stories/

Well - after a number of years of thinking about doing it, I finally completed the task of migrating from MovableType 4.1 to WordPress 2.6.

Truthfully, after researching and working with both platforms over the past two years with clients and personal projects, I have to agree with a number of people that WP has become the default, tweakable blogging/CMS platform. What took me 2.5 days in the last upgrade of my MT installation back in 2006/2007, this was relatively easy, and modifiable. Heck, even when I was worried about the permalink problem, it took a bit of hunting to cobble up my own solution and launch the site. So now, with all of the elements (mostly) fixed, I have redirected the domain to this site - and looking forward to seeing how the site performs.

If you have any suggestions for improvements - or specific plug-ins that would help in engagement. Feel free to add to this post.