De Beers Class Action Suit

Hey, this is sort of a public broadcast announcement.
If you purchased any diamond jewelery and paid >$1000 from any retailer between January 1994 and March 2006, you can get up to %32 of the original price you paid back! The resulting claim amount depends on how many people file claims against the ~$130 million settlement that was reached with De Beers. The settlement is for a suit against commodity price fixing by the diamond monopoly.
I just filed my claim through the official diamond class action settlement site.

Capitalism At Its Best (and Slowest)

I've made my first cent today out of my new shameless commerce division (sorry, Car Talk guys) - see links on right hand side below...
I never thought this pass-time would be able to generate revenue, but my adSense account shows I have $0.01 in my account right now from 1 week of being online... At this rate I'll be able to retire in 100 million weeks or 1.92 million years! Woo hoo!

Clinton, You're Killing Me!

Tonight's democratic debate was more interesting than the last few as Tim and Brian asked nuanced questions all over the board. Clinton came across like a ticking time bomb and made some inappropriate gaffes that would probably help seal the deal against her with any undecided voters in Texas and Ohio (if they even exist). First she complained about always being asked questions first (whiny and insincere - she likes answering the big questions first, because then Obama can only say - "I agree with everything Hillary said"). Then she criticized Obama on not rejecting Farrakhan's support (but got the sound bite wrong - she ended the diatribe saying "it's not enough to denounce, but you should also reject"; that made no sense. She should have said "you should reject the support, not just denounce the speeches"). The mistake cost her the point, because he just made a joke about it.
Obama was just as cool as can be. The black Paul Newman, or a 21st Century Marlboro Man.
I still hope and think she could win. But I think she's doing a terrible job debating him. He jabs at her subtly, while she pounces awkwardly. They showed a clip of her making fun of his naiveté of hope. She should have made the point of the invalidity of the "uniter" idea - 1) there is no reason to believe both sides of the aisle would become liberal if he were to become a president, and 2) he has no experience that indicates he could pull off such a miracle. She could also have linked this delusional fantasy to Bush's 2000 campaigning as a "uniter, not a divider" - showing how 7 years of a "uniter" have caused one of the widest rifts in the population (the only thing we all agree on is that we've had enough of his unitin'). Why isn't she better prepared on this??? Why didn't she defend NAFTA in general, instead of concentrating what's going wrong with it (it needs tweaking; more importantly, our country is best when it evolves - we used to be an agricultural economy, then we became a manufacturing country, now we're gonna create new green technologies, biotechnology solutions to diseases we never thought we could fight, tourist space flight, and who knows what else. NAFTA is part of a liberal economic policy that helps all countries compete on a level playing field and we're just going through growing pains that will eventually lead us to becoming stronger than ever)? Why did she sound cagey on her tax return? Why did she mis-pronounce Medvedev and say "or whatever is name is"? Ugh...
Last week I thought Obama's supporters were deluded. Tonight, I feel disillusioned.

"Dissent is the Mother of Ascent" - Nader '08

Thank holy mother of christ for Ralph Nader...
I am so tired of seeing and hearing and talking about Mr. Old Fart, Mr. (No)Hope, and the honorable senator from New York. So it was nice to see Michael Moore's favorite politician and the leader of the Green (and slightly Red) Party on Meet the Press today announcing his third-party bid for the presidency. He has no chance and I do not support all of his radical stands on policy, but he would make an interesting third wheel at the general election debates. He ripped on Obama, and Tim showed a clip of Obama trashing Nader which I hope will now get more airtime, because it features a halo-less Obama.
On the other hand Nader is older than McCain. Why can't the radical, hippie, feminist Green party produce a younger, less bile-filled candidate for the top office? He's too cranky to excite voters in today's ballot market.

Procrastinating Is My Middle Name

I finally submitted my Foreign Service Written Exam (FSWE) online registration, with 4 days to spare before the deadline for the March test window. I had my online form saved as a draft for over 3 months :) Thank you to everyone who has been helpful (my wife, especially) in the process. I now have to wait for confirmation of my test time. I hope I wasn't too late for March (first come, first serve basis and they have a limit of 5000 people per test window) as that would suck and I may get lashings for it. Hopefully the ball and chain comes back relaxed and in good spirits from her little trip to Cancun (bachelorette party). Washington, here I come!

Last (?) Democratic Primary Debate

Obama sounded like he had a cold tonight. Or has he grown hoarse from shouting empty rhetoric?

Clinton continues to discuss issues with clear concepts and specific policy ideas, while Obama continues to be vague, concentrating simply on the idea that creating a united coalition of policy makers would solve all of our problems. I don't understand why he thinks he would get Republicans to approve any liberal agenda, and I'm not sure what past experience in his career has shown such a capacity to unite opposing political constituencies. If "everyone has a seat at the table" there may be even more rhetoric and less serious reform...

CNN made sure to push them towards nastiness, basically asking each to discuss the other's suckiness. Clinton said she was amused seeing an Obama supporter go mute when asked what some of Obama's accomplishments were... Obama said she was silly for saying he was plagiarizing other people's speeches, and that it is absurd to say that the millions of people and media organizations who voted or endorsed him have been duped and will soon see the light. It may be absurd, but I feel they have been duped. Same way as Bush voters were duped. Why is that so hard to believe in today's media-frenzied society? Every media outlet says Clinton HAS to win Texas and Ohio, but they are neck and neck in delegate counts, so why does she HAVE to win these states? Neither has a chance of getting to the 2025 delegate count before convention so let up pundits! "Clinton's Last Stand", "Last Chance for Clinton", "Make or Break For Clinton". Is this media imitating polls or are polls being influenced by the media frenzy?

Bee Can Moon

My International Relations professor likes to rip on George Bush, and I like to rip on him... He called the current Secretary General of the UN "Bee Can Moon" (1 of 3 syllables right, a failing grade). He also repeats a lot of what I hear on NPR, which is annoying. I like NPR, but I get it for free on the radio. I don't need to pay $500 to hear the same stuff regurgitated with pronunciation mistakes...
Still, this week was quite dense with interesting foreign affairs that we discussed in class:

• US and EU have sanctioned Kosovo's deceleration of independence, while simultaneously noting it should not be taken as as precedent. Basque, Taiwan, Abkhazia and South Ossetia (not to mention Palestine) would be right to call these Western powers hypocrites when it comes to supporting self-determination as a general human right.
• Castro stepped down. Can we get over him, and open trade with Cuba as we have done with other repressive regimes (China being the 800 lb. gorilla in that argument)? Besides the benefit to the people of Cuba, this would also help curb Hugo Chavez's influence in the region.
  
• Pakistan elects an overwhelmingly secular government (even in the NWFP) demonstrating disapproval with the undemocratic Musharraf regime. This could possibly weaken pro-Taleban and Al Qaida forces in the North Western region.
  
• We shot down our own satellite. This was obviously an arms-race muscle flexing. To be honest, I couldn't help but root for it - missing would just give more fodder to war hawks.

But what does US media concentrate on? John McCain's alleged affair with a lobbyist 8 years ago. Shame on us, Americans.

!%$%#@&*%!

What this guy says...

Cupid's Cheap Shot

St. Valentine's Day is the worst fake holiday of the year. If you're single, you feel extra lonely. If you're in a relationship, you feel obligated to celebrate your love. This entails over-paying for meals, flowers, chocolates and greeting cards. Worst part is that you expect everything to be perfect, and since perfect never delivers you always get let down in the end...
This past Valentine's Day, my wife and I went to see a taping of the Colbert Report (sorry Grace). It was the only night open for months. We had to wait for hours, and Colbert is funnier on TV - he's looking right at ya and all the awkward tension is gone. Dinner went horribly (crappy table after reserving weeks in advance, ran out of bread, etc). Got back tired, upset, and stressed out. I wish we just stayed home. When will we learn the lesson? 1 Billion Valentine's greeting cards sold each year - sick...

Blast From the Past

I've been connecting with random people from my past 30 years of life. Friends and acquaintances from Israel (elementary school), Florida (middle and high school, and one year at FIU) that I find or who find me on Facebook. One of them sent me the scanned page out of my middle school yearbook. Not sure, but I think it's eighth grade. It's kind of fun but also sad - how much we all change and how little we have in common despite some coincidental past geographical or social convergence. One thing I'm relieved about is that I'm not nostalgic for the good old days. I'm as happy now as I've ever been and I'm extremely excited about future prospects.

Taking classes at NYU this semester is definitely breathing wind into my deflated, unemployed sails. Out of the three courses I'm enrolled in - International Relations, Middle East Affairs, and International Law - the one I thought I would like least (International Law) is the one I like best so far. Part of it has to do with the guy who's teaching it. He's young, energetic, interesting and he's not elitist or radical as the other two can come across... The one who teaches Middle East is quite big in the field - he's been on the Daily Show :)

Don't Gobama and Get Hillaryous!

Indicative of my sorry mood, when I found out Clinton's campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle resigned on Sunday I immediately assumed the worst - Hillary asked her to do something ethically corrupt a la Primary Colors. This was reinforced further in my depressed mind by today's news of the resignation of deputy manager Mike Henry. After reading a few editorials about the ins-and-outs of the Hillaryland campaign and the so-called resignations (see this and that), I feel a lot better... I have to remain steadfast in my convictions - Hillary is the better candidate for the Democratic ticket. She is a liberal with moderate/centrist credentials, a tough cookie who has been standing up to unending negative attacks, and she is stronger analytically. Her competition is simply afraid of getting into policy discussions with her, because she can run laps around him. I'll concede Obama's grasp of the English language is better than Bush's, but other than that I'm not sure how much better he'd be. If he does win - sadly, now a real possibility - I hope he will fix his broken record (Change, Unity, and more Change) and not become a "Uniter." Wow, some pundit on CNN just quoted Bush's line from his 1999 campaign - "I want to be a uniter not a divider." Is Obama going to start recycling old Bushisms?
Now, THAT's HILLARYOUS!

Vroom Vroom - Look At It Go!

Last week we did some driving practice with the robot:



Danny is driving it... Mohammed is yapping about something excitedly... Others, like me, are just loitering or looking on with varying degrees of interest.



It's getting there. It better get there. This is the last week before we have to ship the robot to the competition. I was there to see the arm go on and we loaded a program that moved it up/down. I will be back there Thursday and I hope the thing will be completed, mechanically speaking. I don't think anyone wants to be there all weekend, which is likely to happen anyways.

Primary Blues

I'm totally depressed about the primaries right now...
First off, I have to eat my share of crow for getting the whole Republican primary wrong. Romney bowed out and McCain is a clear front-runner, despite Limbaugh and Coulter shouting and whining about it. McCain's a good guy, so I'm happy to see the Republican party fall behind a sane candidate. Take that social conservatives!
Second, Hillary Clinton is falling behind all the time on the delegate count and tomorrow's Potomac Primary is looking like another Obama sweep. On national polls pitting Obama and Hillary against McCain, Obama does better. It's getting to me so much that I'm turning racist. Obama is making me racist... Last night durring the Grammys I was cussing at all the black hip hop artists - Kanye West, Rhianna, etc.
Amy Winehouse (a Jew from England) didn't make it any better - she's a total slag. That's weird, I did a goole search for "slag Amy Winehouse" and got a lot of hits. Apparently I wasn't the only one to see her and have the word "slag" pop into my head. Amy "Slag Heap" WInehouse. They just have to stop giving awards to the dregs of society. I mean kids watch these shows...
Ranting definitely gets me in a better mood. I am almost ready to believe Hills still has some hope tomorrow. When people (read: my wife) assumed the worst when the polls came out for New Hampshire I stayed positive, and she pulled through. Maybe the polls have it all wrong again... Let's go Hillary!

Super Mardi - la Rhetorique d'Obama

Just in time for primary elections all over the tristate area, Massachusetts and other points South and West I figured out what's wrong with Obama's general oratory. I've been reading an introductory textbook of Comparative Politics and it has helped me to focus my own political convictions and to formulate another reasoned attack on Obama's campaign platform. For the sake of this argument, I will stay clear of foreign policy- it's a can of worms I want to use as bait in a future diatribe...

Obama talks mostly about change. In terms of political attitudes, change is the banner of radicals (change by force) and liberals (change by gradual reform). I consider myself and the good guys to be liberals, so I should be in love with Obama. The problem is Obama mainly talks about changing the way politicians interact with each other and the general public. He is not really talking about actual on-the-ground change as in reducing economic inequality in America or amending our institutions in meaningful ways that will significantly affect people's lives. He might mention these, but they are not the backbone of his campaign. Sure, politicians seem slimier than ever these days and it would be great to have a more honest, transparent, and even bipartisan body politic in Washington, but all of that is just hot air (read: carbon emissions) unless it brings about actual improvements to our existing, failing institutions. As a liberal and socialist-leaning person I am looking for a candidate who will stand for such reforms.

After living in Britain and seeing a marked difference between their poor and inner-city populace compared with ours, I think one of the greatest problems in our country is that we have a large population of relatively poor, uneducated and unhealthy citizenry. It's sort of an outrage when you think about the general wealth of this nation. Socialist democracies in Europe and even our neighbor to the north have managed to keep their general populations smarter, healthier, and more economically equal without sacrificing much liberties if any in comparison (in fact, the current administration has managed to test the limits of our apathy by taking away some basic liberties such programs as wire-tapping and the suspension of habeas corpus). It is time to learn some lessons from our trans-Atlantic friends and change tack. We need socialist institutions such as national health services (trim the fat, literally), better school system across the country (pay teachers more, fire shitty educators), and - even though it hurts to say it - a more progressive tax system that takes from the rich and gives to the poor. Does Obama promise any of this? No.

In the one domestic policy issue that Clinton and Obama agreed to disagree on - health care - Clinton is the more liberal of the two. She wants mandatory coverage across the board (as a start). Obama is more conservative and simply hopes to reduce costs enough so that most people will elect coverage - laissez-faire health care. Is this is the voice of change? Or is it simply a facade of hope you want to hang your delusional portrait of a brighter tomorrow on? Clinton has been a fervent advocate of socializing our institutions to the modern standard a Western industrial superpower should be measured against. She doesn't necessarily want to be buddy-buddy with her colleagues and bring C-SPAN into every nook and cranny of Washington. She wants to make a positive difference in the lives of the general population of this country.

So Democrats and lucky Independents (living in states with open or modified closed primaries), exercise your vote wisely and seek true reform rather than empty words. Choose Clinton, and keep in mind that Obama will make a great running mate in the fall...

On a decidedly and completely different note, I just happened on this link while googling "clinton obama ticket" - it's a few quick stats on campaign financing. It appears Clinton has raised the most but has spent less than Obama. Evidence of fiscal responsibility? To be researched further in the future if needs be - hoping today is D-Day for Hills.

I am a Giant fan...

of great parties and winning lots of money. This weekend the Giants upset the Patriots' perfect record season by taking home the Super Bowl ring. We were in Boston staying with a friend who was throwing a Super Bowl bash to celebrate what seemed like a sure victory for the New England football franchise. Tough luck. The party was great, though, and we enjoyed being the oddball New York supporters in the room. When the game ended, I got a call from a New York friend who wanted to make sure I wasn't being gang-raped by our host and his posse, and that my new car with NY license plates wasn't being set on fire by rioting fans. To top of it all off, we won over $400 in a Super Bowl Squares pool - took half-time and 3rd quarter!
Meanwhile, the JeffTech Robotics team worked feverishly all weekend to get the robot base up and running. Mohammed (my programming partner) and I downloaded the program we wrote into the robot controller... and found a bug :)
In the following short video, you can see me using a joystick to move the robot. The kid that interjects a comment is Mohammed. He's a 16-year old senior originally from Bangladesh. Good times.