Back from a work and Thanksgiving-induced hiatus. Pretty slow couple of weeks for large firms with a local presence.
India’s Reliance Industries has tendered a non-binding offer for LyondellBasell. Details were not disclosed but sources cited by CBS News Marketwatch say it is in the neighborhood of $12 billion. Rumors [...]
That is the conclusion of a recent survey of Clinton, Iowa wireless network access points conducted by Clinton technology consulting firm, Riverfront Technology, Inc.
“Almost all of the commercial internet service providers now supply their customers with WiFi enabled routers. Many of these come with instructions for enabling the wireless but [...]
In business sector, India’s largest company, Reliant Industries continues its interest in acquiring the North American assets of LyondellBasell. The petrochemical giant floundered into debt-induced Chapter 11 bankruptcy last January. Although no public pronnouncement has been made wth regardst to the size of the offer, industry sources say it [...]
Back in August, we covered an unexpected outbreak of honesty from the International Energy Agency regarding global oil supplies. At that time, we had the IEA Chief Economist admitting for the first time that most of the world’s largest oil fields were at or near peak production.
This week more [...]
As a downtown Clinton business owner I am a member of the Clinton Downtown PartnershipM. The Downtown Partnership recently conducted a survey of residents who live downtown. Surveys were distributed to residents of the following properties:
Van Allen Building Armstrong Building Howes Building Lafayette Building Tucker Building Park Towers90 surveys were distributed and 57 (60%) [...]
Bridgepoint released its 3rd Quarter earnings this week. Highlights:
— Total student enrollment increased 79.7% year-over-year to 54,894 at
the
end of the quarter.
— Revenue increased 111.3% to $127.4 million from $60.3 million for the
same period in 2008.
— Operating income increased 233.2% [...]
Whether or not Iowa pulls it off against Indiana (they are down 21-7 now and Stanzi just threw a 40 yard interception) one thing is clear. Ricky Stanzi cannot throw the football worth a damn. Which is too bad, because he has everything else you want in a QB. Reads [...]
I’ve just started Bruce Sterling’s new book,Carayatids. I’m only a few pages in, so don’t say nothin’!
I heard M.I.A.’s Paper Planes on the “radio” (a streaming radio station). I’d loved the beat of the song when it peaked last year from its use in Slumdog Millionare but [...]
Staying with the football theme for this rainy Monday. The Chicago Fire will start the MLS playoffs next week facing (again!) the New England Revolution in a home-and-away two game series. If familiarity breeds contempt, Fire fans have every reason to hate the Revs as we have faced them in [...]
So, I was perusing some of the Iowa republican-oriented websites this morning. Gotta know what the other side is up to and all that. I stumbled upon this post at iowarepublican. com, Drink of the Week: Football or Futbol?. As has been noted here I have a love-hate relationship [...]
How appropriate, eh? I’m surprised it took me this long. Future of the Left is on tour now.
[...]We do NOT in any way advocate pirating software.
But what I want to know is does the tiny chair come with a tiny Steve Ballmer?
Hosting Your Windows 7 Torrenting Party – watch more funny videos [...]
And it is a pretty happy day. Our experience with Windows 7 at the office has been very positive. I have been running it as my only OS after an in-place upgrade from Vista a week ago. I have almost no complaints. Ryan Voss installed it on his laptop, a [...]
CNN Small Business has Des Moines as the Number 8 mid-sized city in America to launch a small business. Dubuque, Waterloo and Ames are ranked eight, seventeen and eighteen among smaller cites.
Four cities in the top 50. That is eight percent of the total. Considering that Iowa is [...]
Since Windows 7 is right around the corner and since people have somehow been given the impression that I know stuff about technology and stuff, I had to go and install Windows 7 on my every-day work computer. Why expose myself to this potential productivity killing activity? I do it [...]
I don’t know. bit as I looked today, I seem to be missing the better part of three years’ worth of posts. Everything from December 2004 to February 2008 is gone. I’m looking into it. Not that anyone really cares, but I use them to look back and refer to.
[...]Three posts this week:
The Big Lies Part II: The Gays Are Coming For Your Families
Homosexuality has been with us since we climbed out of the trees. The work of humans who prefer the company of their own gender has contributed to what and where we are today as a [...]
I was going to post another nostalgic look back in the form of the Young Fresh Fellows. But then that would be three 80’s bands in a row and I don’t want to come off as an old fogey who doesn’t listen to anything produced after 1990. Nothing could [...]
Reason Number 169,012 why the Internet is TEH AWESOME is shared visualizations. One very clever person can put together a neat graphic that explains a very complex subject in that one-picture-worth-a-thousand-words way and share it with everyone.
Implementing new power technologies like wind and solar that are not tied to always [...]
They asked for “from the left,” they got it.
No one likes to pay taxes. I am a small business owner. If my tax liabilities were to disappear tomorrow it would be the difference between running a business where we just about break even and making a tidy little profit. [...]
New scholarship programs announced for Ashford University.
“These scholarship programs benefit top tier students who have achieved high levels of academic excellence,” said Jane McAuliffe, president of Ashford University and senior vice president/chief academic officer of Bridgepoint Education.
“At Ashford University, we believe that hard working students who have earned good [...]
Latest post at the Des Moines Register: Reality Check Time for the GOP
My new test for taking any Republican candidate for any office seriously is very simple: Can (s)he give a speech and elucidate at least three ideas for improving whatever insitutution (s)he is running for without once mentioning [...]
New post up at the DMR. Radical Transparency for Political Survival.
Want to trim the state budget by a million or three? How many departmental man hours could be saved every year by replacing the work that those departments do in searching, sorting and writing reports against their data if [...]
Today’s Friday Music is “Hittsville UK” by the Clash. I’m one of those radical Clash fans that thinks they belong in the pantheon next to Elvis, The Beatles and Hendrix. But I’m also an iconoclast among Clash fans that thinks that “Sandinista,” their epic, 3 disk, 26 song release [...]
I’m very proud to announce that I have been asked to be a politics blogger for the Des Moines Register. They are starting a new political blogging system with prominent Iowa bloggers from left, right and center. I’ll be posting 3-5 times a week over there. I’ll continue to [...]
Lyondell Chemical was purchased by Netherlands-based firm Basell (owned by a Russian oligarch) in July 2007. The new firm, LyondellBasel, burdened by the $12.7 billion leveraged buyout, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in January of 2009.
LyondellBasell said yesterday that one of its European holding companies had also [...]
Back in May when I expressed the pipe-dream goal of letting Chrysler and GM die I said that there was a new American auto industry waiting to grow fertilized by the corpse of the old.
Well, our Socialist overlords have apparently taken this to heart and have loaned [...]
Still busy with work and a couple of other projects. So, you’ll have to make do with a re-post from The Economist’s excellent Democracy In America blog.
I think this analysis is very close to the mark. Obama’s reasonableness and his ability to “rope-a-dope” those who would undermine his [...]
Been busy at work. A couple of major blog announcements coming up though.
[...]New Feature: Friday Music.
John Scalizi reminded me today that I used to like the Psychedelic Furs quite a bit. Which reminded me of the fact that I saw them live around 1987 or so. They were a bit past their sell-by date but musically they were one of the [...]
This is the latest in an ongoing series entitled, “Everything You Think You Know (ETYTYK) about ‘X’ is Wrong,” designed to illustrate just how much technology and the internet have changed key industries (the X). It is also about how we as consumers and most especially how the industries themselves [...]
From the UK’s Daily Mail:
Here, on a sleepy stretch of shoreline at the far end of Asia, is surely the biggest and most secretive gathering of ships in maritime history. Their numbers are equivalent to the entire British and American navies combined; their tonnage is far greater. Container ships, [...]
The New York Times is running a multi-part series, called Toxic Waters regarding the increasingly poor quality of drinking water across the US. This, despite the Clean Water Act. One of the key points in the series is that despite many thousands of documented violations of state and federal [...]
Returning to a theme here with some updated links.
One of the best features of the Internet is the ability to bring people who are dispersed all over together to work on like-minded projects. This can be don ad-hoc by self-forming groups or by private concerns. Either way, crowdsourcing is [...]
Obama brought the good stuff tonight, the pure stuff, the uncut stuff. All summer long, everyone forgot about That Obama. He’s been looking like Technocrat Obama; quiet, studious, subdued and somewhat aimless. And then he comes off the ropes like Ali again with that glint in his eye. Chuck Grassley, [...]
If the President of the United States of America, wants to make a start-of-the-school-year address to the nation’s children, then he should be able to. Why? Because he’s the goddamn President of the United States of America. It’s one of the perks of the office. You don’t have to like [...]
From the San Diego Union Tribune, the hometown paper Bridgepoint Edcucation (Ticker: BPI), the parent company of Ashford University comes the following story from Saturday, September 5:
San Diego-based Bridgepoint Education, the for-profit operator of online college programs and two universities, was among Wall Street’s top losers yesterday after [...]
Sometime early Friday afternoon a helpful neighbor slipped the following document (PDF file) into the front screen door. It’s text is identical to the letter posted over at that other discussion board. It is clearly meant to be a letter from City Councilman, Mike Kearny to Mayor, Rodger [...]
Woke up bleary-eyed on Sunday morning to find this all over the front page of the New York Times:
The bankers plan to buy “life settlements,” life insurance policies that ill and elderly people sell for cash — $400,000 for a $1 million policy, say, depending on the life expectancy [...]
Warning. Locker-room language
For all of you who thought that I was just a limp-wristed soccer fan, think again. This football post is about pigskin. Sure, I have my problems with American Football (a.k.a. rugby for pussies). The games are way to freakin’ long for one thing. I don’t have 3.5 [...]
I thought it was odd last night about 5 p.m. when I could no longer see the forums on the front page of the Herald Website in Google Chrome, which I’ve been happily using as my primary web browser. But they were still visible and readable in with Firefox and [...]
An effort to raise the state gas tax as a way to pay for the badly underfunded road budget in Iowa was seriously studied but came nowhere close to passing last year. Opponents criticized the measure as a way to strangle the economy.
Via The Economist comes a nice [...]
Warts and all his rise, fall and rise again was one of the great American stories. Love or hate him, he was without a doubt the greatest legislator of our age. His fingerprints are on nearly every major piece of legislation passed in the last 40 years. I’m sad that [...]
Laura is in Nashville tending to her parents’ long term care needs. Meeting up with my step-Dad in Waterloo and going to Lost Island Waterpark in Waterloo.
[...]From Chris Good at The Atlantic comes the reminder that when it comes to politics, ol’ Niccolo Machiavelli had this stuff figured out 500 years ago.
Thinking in the context of the health care debate and why the democrats seem (comparatively) so weak in their level of support:
It [...]
There’s a new web site called, Walk Score that gives your neighborhood a “walkability index” based on how many shops, restauants and other amenities are within walking distance. Kind of neat.
My neighborhood scores 57 out of 100, Somewhat Walkable. There are some questions regarding the quality of the [...]
While tout le monde flakes off on their state-subsidized and/or mandates three week vacations, those of us who live in the utopian wonderland that is the USA continue to work away to pay for our bestest-in-the-world health care and stuff.
Not a whole lot going on in technology and politics…
But [...]
The idea here at re-burbia is to repair the poor use of space by strip-mall and fast-food architecture with infill buildings and repurpose the original building.
We were discussing in a meeting last week the fact that Clinton (like many small towns) after encouraging so much non-downtown development along [...]
Taking a four-day weekend to recharge the batteries and catch up on past-due writing assignments. Movies too.
Going to go see District 9 tonight with grown-ups. Taking the kids to see Ponyo. Miyazaki WIN!
[...]As a follow-up to yesterday’s post below is a chart showing Fox News viewership alongside GOP approval (as measured by CBS/NYT polling).
Per Gawker’s post:
But while cable news is niche, politics is mass. The chart above shows GOP party approval in as reported by New York Times/CBS in national [...]
Back in June I talked about my general sense of optimism and to a certain extent a bit of complacency with regards to the ascendancy of progressive politics for the foreseeable future.
I wrote: “Republicans on the other hand are faced with somehow completely transforming their party ideologicaly and demographically. [...]
Say what you want about the guy, that was one serious booty call. Seriously though, that was some crazy deft geopolitical ju-jitsu on the part of both the Obama administration and Mr. Clinton. Proof is in the deafening silence from the right.
I’m having a brutal week. A client has been [...]
Oh joy! I haven’t had much to say about peak oil in some time what with the economy falling off a cliff and taking energy demand with it. But it’s been there, lurking in the wings, waiting to have its say in any economic takeoff. So, today the well-respected Chief [...]
Another post that starts with a book plug. The Transparent Society by David Brin. Brin is a SF writer by trade and an prolific libertarian-leaning writer of nonfiction. The premise of The Transparent Society is that basically privacy as we know it is nonexistent. “The Man” has access [...]
Even if you aren’t really into Science Fiction, if you want your mind to be totally blown, try Accelerando, by Charles Stross. It is a collection of nine interconnected short stories telling the tale of three generations of a disfunctional family before during and after a technological singularity.
Acelerando won [...]
Just got back from the KROS studios in Clinton where I was talking about what options are available to CIS subscribers and businesses. No announcement yet from CIS.
The curious thing, which I mentioned on the radio, is that CIS has significant assets both physical and virtual and could very easily [...]
Robert Kramer III performed a great mitzvah for for the world when he ran down and sued into the ground a number of spammers based in the United States. Although it is unlikely that Bob Kramer, owner of CIS Internet Services ever saw even a tenth part of [...]
From The Economist, a very well done and easily understood graphic on the history of the American economy and the fundamental instability of our consumer-oriented growth from the 1980’s to 2007.
[...]Busy as all hell. Not abandoning the blog again.
Had a very pleasant and restful Sunday. The first in a few weeks. Took a couple hours to go out on the Mississippi with Turbo and take some pictures. Feel free to share. All images are Creative Commons Licensed Attribution, No Derivitives.
[...]
It was shocking to hear that City Administrator, Gary Boden was tossed out of City Hall two weeks ago. Not suprising, but a bit shocking. I have worked with Mr. Boden on a number of projects since he took that position in early 2007. He could be very abrasive but [...]
Appalachian Trail…? More like Argentine tail!
Sorry, had to go there. I can’t be the first to think of that can I? Copyright!
Update: I’m clever. Just two days late clever. Memo to self: First Google, then post
[...]Just a couple of notes on the site. First of all, welcome to new and returning readers. Since I started blogging again consistently in late April I have seen the readership climb steadily. I now get about 150 unique visits a day which is very, very modest but welcome. Back [...]
In addition to the day-to-day fun of being a local network technology guy, I am also a Contributing Editor for CDW Biz Tech Magazine, the in-house technology publication that goes out to all business clients of tech retail giant, Computer Discount Warehouse.
I’m on deadline for one article [...]
I’m on a writing deadline this weekend and early next week. More on that later. Also, I’ve been literally glued to the computer watching what is going on in Iran.
In 1517 Martin Luther nailed his 95 Theses to the church house door in Wittenburg, sparking the Protestant Reformation. This [...]
Via Andrew Sullivan who is “doing the Lord’s work,” aggregating news from Iran.
Work is killing me. More soon.
[...]At least not for now. If you want to get the skinny on the might-be-revolution you will need to get on the Internets.
In case you missed it, Iran had a presidential election on Friday. In Iran’s quasi-theocratic regieme the [...]
EYTYK = Everything You Think You Know.
The relentless drumbeat from the music and movie industries for the last ten years can be summarized thusly: “Help! Illegal downloads are killing us. We need Big Brother to squash our customers for us!”
Wrong!! There are two things killing (at least) the music [...]
This post isn’t completely technology-oriented but it still shows how organizations can give up some centralized control to members/customers and harness the power of community production. It’s also just a cool story.
Drew Carey is the part owner of the
Seattle Sounders Major League Soccer club. Seattle is [...]
I know, I know. It’s only been a few days and I’m back at the politics. In my defense, this is technology and social-networking related. It seems Sen. Grassley has discovered twitter and fired off the above tweets over the weekend. When questioned by reporters as [...]
It is almost an article of faith at this point that Barack Obama is “the Internet President,” having perfected the medium as a campaign tool, he is using it to open up the workings of government. For example,recovery.gov, data.gov and the White House Open Government Initiative. Obama [...]
This blog has a lot of catching up to do. My local readers will probably know that after running for City Council in late 2007 I then dedicated myself to the Obama campaign. Not long after that was over my mother succumbed to leukemia. Right after *that* my employer informed [...]
and vice versa. Those were the words of General Motors’ then-President Charles Wilson in 1953 at his confirmation hearings to become Secretary of Defense.
A couple of weeks ago, I made the argument — knowing perfectly well that it would never happen — that the best thing for the [...]
On Wednesday the 20th, I attended the Chamber of Commerce, Biz After 5, at Ashford University’s call center out on the bypass. The food and drink spread was very nice. Before anything else, let me just say that the facility is great, Ashford made a great decision (albeit with some [...]
Sorry for the light posting. After a couple of pretty slow months at work it seemed like this was Everyone Call At Once week. And a short one at that. I’ve got a couple of original posts' [...]
There is only one thing green about this classic beetle I saw parked out in front of the YWCA Friday. But it is full of win! And yes, there is a VW pancake 4 under there.
[...]Way back in 2005, I posted, The Environmental Movement is Dead, about how the traditional environmental movement — centered around the big lobbying groups such as the Sierra Club and their associated policy initiatives — had failed to do anything to apply real brakes to the decline in the [...]
Danger Mouse is probably the most brilliant writer-producer working in music today. But his musical skills aren’t really the point here. This blog is about technology and change. And Danger Mouse is showing the recording industry just how powerless it has [...]
Via the Wall Street Journal, Finally, A Real Revolution
Limiting the power of government to take precedence over the rights of individuals is crucial. ProReforma puts it this way in one of its educational brochures: “No country, in no time has had success with a democratic model that grants the [...]
Despite (because of?) the ridicule of his career as a community organizer, Barack Obama may turn out to be the greatest community organizer since Gandhi and King.
[...]
This sign reads: I WILL NOT BE AFRAID TO GO OUT INTO THE STREETS, DEFEND MY LIBERTY, UPHOLD THE LAW, DEMAND JUSTICE, I WILL NOT BE AFRAID TO LIVE IN MY HOMELAND AND CHANGE ITS FUTURE…. GUATEMALA, I WILL NOT ABANDON YOU.
How does mass collaboration [...]
You: You heartless bastard! What about the jobs?
Me: Chrysler employs 60,000 people. That’s a rounding error in the total number of jobs lost since the current downturn started. GM employs 240,000 globally, approximately 98,000 U.S. Again, compared to the 2.5 million lost jobs since October, 2008 those aren’t particularly [...]
Ignore
Technorati Profile
Via the Center for American Progress Action Fund a quick video on how union elections really (don’t) work in this country. For the next time someone complains about how unions are the root of our economic development problems in this state…
[...]Hans Rosling is a professor of Health Statistics in Stockholm, Sweeden. Last year he helped develop a fascinating bit of informatics software called, Gapminder.
Be warned though, clicking on that last link will take you to a fascinating, time-sucking world of really cool information visualizations that will utterly challenge [...]
At his press conference last week, President Obama stated once again that if the congressional Republican’s actually had anything useful to add to debates on any issues — outside of the same-old-same-old — that he’d be glad to work with him.
The United States beat Mexico 2-0 last Wednesday in a 2010 World Cup qualification match. This was our home game in the six team, round robin tournament that will select four nations from the North American and Caribbean region for the 32 team fnals in South Africa next year. The [...]
The Stimulus Bill passed the House last night without a single Republican vote. President Obama had met with Republican leaders, heard their concerns. Obama made concessions that he wouldn’t have made if he didn’t want Republican support. As the vote indicated, he didn’t need any Republican votes in the House [...]
Ya know, it really is about time we started establishing equivalency for people who rip off billions of dollars with people who kill and deal drugs. Here are some people who richly (get it, richly?) deserve to do some hard time.
If nothing else, they need to have their assets seized, [...]
From the local right, Krusty Conservative says, One Word: Ambiguous:
My reaction to President Obama’s inaugural address is split. On one hand it had plenty of lofty rhetoric which is to be expected in a speech of this stature. On the other hand, George W. Bush could have given [...]
That last post was just weird.
And Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger III is one hot-shit pilot. Glider certified too. Which came in handy.
[...]
