blueZhift Blog

Awww right! Break out the champagne! Cnet news reports that the University of Illinois tied for 17th place in the world finals of the Association for Computing Machinery International Collegiate Programming Contest. The article then goes on to bemoan the fact that this is the worst showing ever for a U.S. team and that this means that the U.S. is slipping as a leader in technology, blah, blah, blah…

Well duh! Why should the best and brightest in the U.S. bother with careers in technology when those jobs are being shipped overseas in the name of cost cutting? Ironically, the article suggests that higher pay would entice more Americans to seek tech careers! Hellooooo! The jobs are going away because U.S. companies don’t want to pay higher salaries when they can throw rooms full of Indian, Russian, or Chinese programmers at the problem for a fraction of the cost. So is it any surprise that Americans are not interested?

As usual, the education system is also blamed for the slide. Yes the education system needs a serious overhaul, but that is not going to affect the interest of Americans in technology careers. Not only are the jobs going away to cheaper shores, but generally Americans revile those who are most interested in science and technology. On the one hand geeks and nerds are endlessly harassed in school, which is basically expected. And on the other hand the current social climate is more interested in divine revelation than research as the basis of government policy.

If we really want to reverse the trend we need to teach our people how to be entrepreneurs! Techies shouldn’t expect or be trained just to be cogs at HP, Microsoft, or IBM. The real action is going to happen in the startups where bright people will lay it all on the line and really push the envelope. I think the U.S. is still one of the best environments for this to happen, but we don’t really teach our people how to do this and indeed to expect to do this rather than being wage slaves for a lifetime. If we’re such a great capitalistic country, then let’s get serious and teach our people to be real capitalists!

Well it looks like Senator, and prospective 2008 Presidential candidate, Hillary Rodham Clinton has jumped on the anti-violent video games bandwagon. She’s slamming Grand Theft Auto for its violence against women and minorities and wants to spend $90M to study the threat that these games pose to children. So this makes it official, as I’ve mused before, there is no political downside to slamming violent and so called mature video games even if it means proposing laws that are clearly unconstitutional. You score points with the political right and conservatives without the danger that the bans and restrictions will stand the test of the courts. Then score more points complaining about the judges who strike the laws down. Since the democrats are on the out right now, watch for more dems to jump on the bandwagon. This is a no brainer!

Here is a bit of humor that I just got from a friend. I don’t know the original source, but you will say "Ouch!" at the end. Thanks John!

1. The Wall Street Journal is read by the people who run the country.

2. The Washington Post is read by people who think they run the country.

3. The New York Times is read by people who think they should run the country and who are very good at crossword puzzles.

4. USA Today is read by people who think they ought to run the country but don’t really understand The New York Times.

They do, however, like their statistics shown in pie charts.

5. The Los Angeles Times is read by people who wouldn’t mind running the country — if they could find the time –and if they didn’t have to leave Southern California.

6. The Boston Globe is read by people whose parents used to run the country and did a far superior job of it, thank you very much.

7. The New York Daily News is read by people who aren’t too sure who’s running the country and don’t really care as long as they can get a seat on the train.

8. The New York Post is read by people who don’t care who’s running the country as long as they do something really scandalous, preferably while intoxicated.

9. The Miami Herald is read by people who are running another country but need the baseball scores.

10. The San Francisco Chronicle is read by people who aren’t sure there is a country … or that anyone is running it; but if so, they oppose all that they stand for. There are occasional exceptions if the leaders are handicapped minority feminist atheist dwarfs who also happen to be illegal aliens from any other country or galaxy provided, of course, that they are not Republicans.

11. The National Enquirer is read by people trapped in line at the grocery store.

12. None of these is read by the guy who is running the country into the ground.

In a strange twist I found a story in which Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich blasts Narc for its drug use on  the same page as a link to a story in which the very same governor supports lowering the gun ownership age in Illinois from 21 to 18!

Now let me get this straight, simulated violence and mayhem is so bad for young people that we must usurp parental authority and trample all over the U.S. Constitution in order to ban the sale of violent or sexually explicit video games to minors, but it is okay to arm teenagers with real weapons. Now admittedly, the story about lowering the gun ownership age is nearly a year old, so I wonder why it would still be a related link. Nevertheless, I can smell some serious political pandering going on as the governor seems to be trying to appeal to conservative voters and the gun lobby as his reelection campaign begins. In light of the recent teenage shooting rampage in Minnesota, I wonder if the governor is still so gung-ho to put weapons into the hands of teens.

As for Narc, I guess the governor and the game stand to gain handsomely from all of the free publicity even if both of them are full of crap. Okay, okay, that was a little harsh. Only one of them is full of crap, but I’m not saying which one!

The irony of the Terri Schiavo right to die (or right to live depending on your take) case is almost too much to take. It’s ironic that the condition that resulted in her vegetative state was an eating disorder and now for 15 long years what’s left of her has had to endure being fed via a plastic tube down her throat. Now with the, hopefully, final removal of the tube, the death watch has begun or is it perhaps about to end? If indeed our immortal souls are somehow tied to this plane of existence until the physical body ceases to function, then I can only imagine the 15 years of hell Terri has had to endure. I hope that God and the prayers of her friends and family have been of some comfort to that soul, but there’s no way to know. The final irony is that because many of us don’t really know what life is and fear death so much, Terri’s body must slowly starve to death.

There’s no room in our hearts for a merciful end that even the most vile murderers are entitled to. Starvation is a cruel and painful way to die. We put people in jail for starving animals, why can’t we give Terri a dignified send off to the next world? In the same situation, I think I would want my body put down in a gentle and dignified manner rather than be at the center of self serving politicians and misguided do-gooders both causing pain to the ones I love. One could argue that such euthanasia usurps God’s role as master of our lives, and is driven by the selfish urge to escape the physical pain of death. But I would argue that we must also consider the pain of those around us, in which case a dignified death becomes a sacrifice for the sake of those we love. Which is better?