Life is Unfair for Web Developers

Via thenextweb.com:

Russians Invade, Palin Doesn’t Notice

Wait, you mean Sarah Palin didn’t see them rowing over from her house?

WASHINGTON — Ten people have been arrested for allegedly serving as secret agents of the Russian government in the United States, the Justice Department said Monday.

Eight of 10 were arrested Sunday for allegedly carrying out long-term, deep cover assignments in the United States on behalf of Russia.

Their job, according to the court papers in the case, was “to search and develop ties in policymaking circles” in the United States.

…

The U.S. government intercepted a message from Russian intelligence headquarters in Moscow to two of the defendants, Richard and Cynthia Murphy.

“You were sent to USA for long-term service trip,” the message from Moscow. “Your education, bank accounts, car, house etc. – all these serve one goal: fulfill your main mission, i.e. to search and develop ties in policymaking circles in US and sent intels,” the message added.

Movie Shot on an iPhone 4

“Apple of My Eye” – an iPhone 4 film from Michael Koerbel on Vimeo.

Indy’s New Trash System Stinks

I just got back in town from my two weeks at VU and today was the first day I got to see Indy’s new trash pickup system in action.

What I was Told:

Indianapolis residents will receive a new 96-gallon trash can. Put all your shit in the trash can and a truck will come along with a big mechanical arm and it’ll pickup your shit and dump it in the dump truck. The can will then be set down neatly in the same spot. This will improve safety and speed for the drivers, as they no longer require Public Works men to stand on the backs of trucks.

What I Just Witnessed:

Indianapolis residents received a 96-gallon trash can. Everyone puts all their shit in that can now. A newerish looking truck drove up to my driveway. Two Hispanic men hopped off the back of the truck, practically fell into my trash can to dig out the shit I threw in there and they threw it in the back of the truck. No arm, no increased safety and it certainly wasn’t faster because they have to go pulling shit out of a giant man-sized can.

So, let’s recap. 800,000 residents received a new trash can. That probably cost us about $10 million ($13 a can). The trucks got painted white and we replaced the two black men on the back of the truck with two Hispanic men. The labor costs maybe saved us, oh, $4 million a year.

That’s about a net loss of about $6 million. The new system is slower, more expensive and less safe because men are now falling all over themselves inside giant shit holes.

That’s good governin’.

You Caught Me

Via i can read:

It takes 7 seconds for food to pass from mouth to stomach. A human hair can hold 3kg. The length of the penis is three times the length of the thumb. The femur is as hard as concrete. A woman’s heart beats faster than a man’s. Women blink twice as much as men. We use 300 muscle just to keep our balance when we stand.

The woman has read this entire text. The man is still looking at his thumb.

Education Today

I just spent the last 2.5 weeks at Vincennes University working with an early college readiness program. The students had a good time, for the most part, and seemed to get a lot of the experience.

I’ve spent the better part of a week trying to figure out why I agreed to work there in the first place. Then, I ran across this comment on Digg today that pretty much sums it up:

The school system is a joke.

I spent 12 years reading textbooks and taking tests and learned nothing about REAL WORLD problems and how to overcome them.

How to write a check. How to pay bills on time and why it’s important. How to buy a car. How to buy a house. How to NOT get into credit card debt. How to change a tire. How to fix household items. How to get a job. How to keep a job. Communication skills and why they’re important.

These are all skills I had to learn on my own, because in school I was too busy learning how to factor a polynomial and building bird houses.

Autoshop [sic] was OPTIONAL, and 2 years foreign language REQUIRED. It’s great that I can say “Good Morning” in Spanish, but I still have no idea how to change the oil in my car.

I’m home-schooling my kids.

I agree with most of this, but not all. I don’t think the school system is useful today. The students we worked with at VU were on the right track thanks to Ben Davis Univ. HS, Arsenal and Center Grove high schools. They get a HS Diploma and an Associate’s Degree from VU before they’re old enough to drink. Frankly, HS diplomas need to be abolished and Associate’s made the norm.

Some would argue that school “teaches people how to think”, but that’s what everyone says about college. So, that can’t be it.

I’m not sure knowing how to change the oil in your car is all that necessary. Even if I knew how to do it, I wouldn’t want to. And home-schooling should almost be put on-par with child abuse. You end up with too many kids incapable of socializing and functioning with everyone else.

But, they’re a lot of practical things in life that schools don’t teach well or at all. Like financial management, how to live with dignity, respect others, etc. Hopefully, these are all things I helped impart on the students at X-Mester.

McDonald’s Airs Pro-Gay Ad in France

This’ll never reach American shores, that’s for sure. Nice ad, though. Actually makes me like McDonald’s a little.

Burt n’ Kurt

Last night’s episode of Glee was unfortunately lacking One Sue Sylvester™, but it did have one scene in particular worth talking about. This is FOX, in it’s primetime slot right after American Idol, with a Dad from “Real America” (western Ohio) talking about how to love and protect his gay son. Unlike drag shows, this actually helps.

On a related note, I just realized last  night that their names are Burt and Kurt. Cute.

IndyGo Resembles a Bus Crash Scene

This IndyGo dealio is really like watching a bus collide with another bus:

They showed that routes the agency plans to cut — the 11, 55 and 87 — have among the lowest ridership of all 29 routes.

They explained that the door-to-door paratransit service, known as Open Door, is far more expensive to operate than fixed-route service — $35 per passenger versus about $4.

Well. There’s yer problem, son. IndyGo’s average rider fare is $1.75. They want to raise it $2. That means they’re, uh, still $2 short. If it costs $4 per passenger to operate the system, I’d be charging $4 a rider!

Assuming a person were to drive from one end of Marion County to Downtown, that’d be about 11 miles. The average cost-per-mile to include wear-and-tear, gas, oil, insurance, etc. is 50 cents a mile. That’s $5.50, or $11.00 round-trip by car. A bus fare would be $8, round-trip at the full cost to the rider, which is still a net savings of $3 for the rider to take the bus.

Heck, they could raise the fares to $3 a trip and there’d be even more savings for the rider vs. driving a car and they’d close their budget cap overnight. Or, you could subsidize some riders and not others. They’re a number of riders that take the bus because they can’t drive — maybe they have DUIs, seizures, want to be eco-friendly or are just plain afraid to get in a car. They may likely be perfectly capable of affording a car, but can’t or just don’t want to drive one. In which case, charge them $4 a ride and the poor folks can get a $3 fare.

Somehow, though, that was lost among those at the public hearing:

“It took me an hour and a half to get from my house to Washington (Street to catch the bus),” said regular IndyGo rider Nora Wright, her voice shaking with anger. “I don’t think that’s right.”

…

Then came the personal attacks and accusations.

“Thank you for lying to us all!” one person yelled toward a table where IndyGo employees were seated.

Another man, shouting at Terry, demanded to know: “What kind of car do you drive?” (Terry said he hasn’t owned a car since the 1990s.)

She’s right — that’s not right. IndyGo needs to beef up and attract more riders. They do that by improving service and adding busses to make it more convenient and faster. A 10 minute car trip takes 40 minutes by bus, if you’re lucky enough to live and work close to the stops. And you fix these problems by generating revenue. They can’t look to the government for funding — there isn’t any. Alas, raise the fares on a tiered system to provide better service, get people where they need to go and all the while helping those less fortunate.

Rand Paul Likes Property Rights, Sorta Cares About Civil Ones

An interesting story caught my eye yesterday about Kentucky’s upcoming GOP Senate candidate, Rand Paul. Rachel Maddow asked him the following:

Maddow: Do you think that a private business has a right to say that ‘We don’t serve black people?’

Paul: I’m not in favor of any discrimination of any form. I would never belong to any club that excluded anybody for race. We still do have private clubs in America that can discriminate based on race.

But I think what’s important in this debate is not getting into any specific “gotcha” on this, but asking the question ‘What about freedom of speech?’ Should we limit speech from people we find abhorrent. Should we limit racists from speaking. I don’t want to be associated with those people, but I also don’t want to limit their speech in any way in the sense that we tolerate boorish and uncivilized behavior because that’s one of the things that freedom requires is that we allow people to be boorish and uncivilized, but that doesn’t mean we approve of it…

Now, I see what’s he saying. He danced around quite a bit, but as politicians go, that’s a pretty honest response. It’s a very libertarian stance, which isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And he’s not coming off as racist and I don’t believe he is. Basically, it boils down to “The government and its public money won’t discriminate because it’s the right thing to do. But, if, for example, a restaurant owner who owns and runs his own establishment decides they don’t want to serve a group of people, I guess that’s their right.”

It’s realizing we can’t change the way people think, necessarily. So, let them do whatever they want on their own property. It’s their business — if people don’t like it and disagree, they’ll go elsewhere and the business will fail with no one else to blame but the owner. It’s not any different if I don’t want people on my front yard — whether they’re a majority or minority. It’s my property and if I don’t want you there, I’ll call the police and they’ll remove you.

The trick, however, is that Rand has to have the same feelings about every other law. Does this mean that if a person were to smoke marijuana on his property, the government has no right to stop them? It’s not harming anyone, so what right do they have? This doesn’t mean the government can’t say no to its use on public property like schools, hospitals, parks, etc. That could be treated just like alcohol and tobacco.

One could easily argue that the point here is to protect minorities and without the government’s help, they’ll never have rights. That’s absolutely right. But, it doesn’t cost the government anything to say, for example, “gays now have equal rights”. And, if people don’t want to change their views about gays, fine. But, if a gay couple is on their own property and not doing anything lewd or harmful, they’re protected from people who do harm them on their property and in public places. And if a business owner doesn’t want gay people in his establishment, fine. They lost a customer and revenue and it’s their own fault what happens from there.

And, just as an aside because I know someone is thinking about it: I’m not really a fan of hate crimes for minorities. You have to stop treating people like minorities/majorities and just treat them like people. If someone is killed, someone is killed and it’s wrong and our system of laws will convict and punish the killer. But to say that because someone killed a black woman and not a white woman they have to spend an extra 10 years in jail (or whatever it is), I don’t think that’s fair. Plus, it’s not like anyone ever said, “Oh, I’d better target the white guy so I don’t get charged with a hate crime.”