Some of Conservative Judaism's top leaders found little to criticize within their own movement when they gathered together December 7 for a panel discussion on the future direction of their troubled denomination. ...
Read More... [Source: Conservative - Google Blog Search]
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Our American Flag
by The American Illuminati.
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Our Capitol
by The American Illuminati.
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Our First Flag
by The American Illuminati.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
The Heritage Foundation's Steven Groves and Ben Lieberman are live at the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference reporting from a conservative perspective. Follow their reports on The Foundry and at the Copenhagen Consequences Web site. ...
Read More... [Source: Conservative - Google Blog Search]
Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Hydrogen, Europe/EU
Back in May, 30 teams driving pure electric and hydrogen vehicles participated in theEVS Viking Rally from Oslo to Stavanger, Norway to mark the 24th Electric Vehicle Symposium (EVS) and the opening of the Hynor Hydrogen Road. For 2010, the event is changing its name to the Zero Emission Rally (see?) and will again feature plug-in hybrids, EVs and H2 cars. Instead of sticking to the main roads as it did in 2009, the 2010 route will send the vehicles on smaller back roads. Tipster and translator Finn S. says that there is no explanation in the Norwegian article on BilNorge about whether these rural areas have been outfitted with hydrogen refueling stations or high-speed EV recharginginfrastructure. During a California-to-Canada hydrogen car rally earlier this year, the organizers brought the hydrogen along in big tanker trucks. Thanks to Finn S. for the tip!
[Source: BilNorge, Photo: Cato Buch / ZERO]
Norway's Hydrogen Highway gets an electric back road originally appeared on Autoblog Green on Sun, 13 Dec 2009 14:57:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read | Permalink | Email this | CommentsRead More... [Source: Autoblog Green]
Android's always in need of a better browser. Hell, every mobile platform is -- yes, even your precious Pres and iPhones can always stand to eke out a little more speed, a little more rendering capability, and a little more functionality (yeah, that's right, Flash), and Opera Mobile has always been at or near the top of the game. Version 10 -- which is currently in public beta for Windows Mobile and Symbian -- has now been turned loose on Android, but the catch is that it's only available to carriers and manufacturers of devices right now. The reason? Opera claims that these versions "present limitations that hinder mass consumer distribution" without elaborating -- and if you ask us, Android's built-in browser has plenty of "limitations" in its own right, so seriously, Opera, go ahead and turn it loose. We won't judge. Okay, maybe we will, but we'll go easy.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Opera Mobile 10 for Android now available, but not to you originally appeared on Engadget Mobile on Thu, 10 Dec 2009 18:38:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Here�s a good catch by CNN from this White House video that provides a behind-the-scenes look at the Obama administration�s cabinet meetings.
While it appears almost the entire cabinet uses BlackBerry as their smartphone of choice (I think I see one Razr in the pile � really?), all devices are to be left at the door before meetings begin.
As you can see, the relatively low-tech way of keeping track of which phone belongs to which statesman is fairly amusing. It also appears that United States Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice needs no less than three BlackBerry devices to remain connected.
Here�s a big screen capture:
Tags: blackberry, Mobile 2.0, smartphones, whitehouse
Read More... [Source: Mashable!]
Last week I recorded an episode of Bloggingheads.tv with Jim Manzi, a tech entrepreneur and frequent blogger on conservative websites on the subject of climate change. Manzi is known as one of the (few) reasonable conservatives on the ...
Read More... [Source: Conservative - Google Blog Search]
We're doing a much longer than expected series of articles on the low level dungeon runners now that the new cross-realm Dungeon Finder is up and running. This is part two of our series on the low level tank. Last week we talked about the basics of threat, avoidance, mitigation, and what stats to be on the lookout for when choosing gear.
We did promise to get into talents and skills this week, but that would have ended up being three pages long. So we're going to leave skills until next week and just concentrate on talents this time around. If you're extremely new, take a look at this nice article explaining talents for new players. If you've got that down, let's start move on to more paladin specific info.
Continue reading The Light and How to Swing It: The low level tank part 2
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, (Paladin) The Light and How to Swing It
The Light and How to Swing It: The low level tank part 2 originally appeared on WoW.com on Sat, 12 Dec 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Every weekend, we comb our memories and archives to compile 10 useful items addressing a specific topic you may have forgotten about, or just happen to be excellent. Here are the 20 list(icle) posts that proved the most popular in 2009.
1. Top 10 Tiny & Awesome Windows Utilities
The best boxing doesn't always happen at the heavyweight level. Likewise, some of the best things you can load onto your Windows system are tiny little guys that just make day-to-day writing, working, and surfing better.
2. Top 10 Must-Have Firefox Extensions, 2009 Edition
We didn't change everything from our original 2006 list, but we did mix up our favorite add-ons for our favorite browser with a few essentials that Lifehacker editors, and readers, have found indispensable.
3. Top 10 Windows 7 Boosters
Just before Windows 7 dropped, we put together the apps that developers had updated or released new to integrate with Windows 7. Some add in things missing from Microsoft's latest OS, while others improve on what's already there.
4. Top 10 Firefox 3.5 Features
To think that Firefox 3.5 was almost labeled 3.1, a small iteration. The latest release included a lot to crow about, including much-needed performance improvements, but also many subtle refinements.
5. Top 10 Underhyped Webapps, 2009 Edition
Gina had only compiled her list less than two years ago, but the web's become an even bigger playground for developers since then. The truly helpful and useful ones, without gigantic advertising budgets, were worth highlighting. Photo by thievingjoker.
6. Top 10 Tricks MacGyver Would Be Proud Of
This was Adam's favorite Top 10 of at least the year, if not possibly all time. Either he's really into short, goofy fan fiction, or just appreciates a number of 1980s pop-culture references sprinkled into his listicles. Either way, it's fun to make like everyone's favorite duct tape enthusiast with these clever hacks. Image by PoweredByLarios�.
7. Top 10 Ubuntu Downloads
Free software rocks, and free software running on a free platform is heavenly stuff. Check out the apps that make Ubuntu a better place to work, play, and explore. Image by Andrew Mason.
8. Top 10 Battery Hacks, Tips, And Tricks
Modern batteries help us feel like we're living in the future, with cellphones that can do anything and laptops that can work anywhere—when they're fully charged. Otherwise, getting the most out of them requires some old-fashioned cleverness and energy frugality, detailed in these tips. Photo by conskeptical.
9. Top 10 Cheap or Free Home Theater Upgrades
Once everything's hooked up, it's easy to just point your HD TV in the right direction and call it a day on your home theater setup. Take on a few of these projects and pointers, though, and you'll get a nicer-looking, better-performing system. Photo by chunkysalsa.
10. Top 10 Skills to Master Your Grill
Why was this so popular? Because almost everybody loves an excuse to be outside, and nearly everyone loves an excuse to obsess over tasty food. That's just our guess, anyways, and these 10 skills testify to how geeky this excuse can really get. Photo by adactio.
Those 10 may have been the most popular, but if you're still eager for some more listicle goodies, here's a quick overview of the next ten most popular.
- 11. Top 10 Tools for a Free Online Education
"It's easy to forget these days that the internet started out as a place for academics and researchers to trade data and knowledge. Recapture the web's brain-expanding potential with these free resources for educating yourself online." - 12. Top 10 Apps that Boost Your Media Center
"Streaming video, digital DVD backups, DVR recording-it's all possible from your TV-connected media center, and you don't need a system administrator to pull it off. These 10 apps make filling and controlling your media center PC even easier." - 13. Top 10 Home Office Hacks
"Whatever kind of work you do at home, your office is one place you want to spend the time to make comfortable and convenient. Take 10 of our tips on organizing, fixing, and streamlining that space." - 14. Top 10 Tricks for Creatively Hiding Your Stuff - Security - Lifehacker
"Every kid has a creative stash for secret stuff, but that useful enthusiasm doesn't have to die off just because we've traded treehouses for desks. See how you can hide money, files, workspaces, and more in today's Top 10." - 15. Top 10 Computer Hardware Fixes and Upgrades - Hardware - Lifehacker
"If your desktop or laptop parts have died or seen better days, you've got a friend. All of your Lifehacker editors-and many helpful net denizens-have upgraded or repaired faulty systems, and we've rounded up some of their most helpful tutorials." - 16. Top 10 Productivity Basics Explained
"There's a core set of habits and techniques that filter and color a lot of what we write about at Lifehacker, but we rarely step back to explain them for newcomers. Let's get back to basics with 10 productivity tactics." - 17. Top 10 Tools for Your Blog or Web Site
"Having your own hosted web domain has never been cheaper, or easier, with the vast array of free resources out there. Here are our ten favorite tools to help anyone launch and maintain their internet presence." - 18. Top 10 Tips and Tricks for Better Coffee
Coffee doesn't always make work better, but you can definitely work to get better coffee. From four-cup hotel machines to French presses, from home-roasted beans to decorative foam-we've got a wealth of tips for enjoying a better cup. - 19. Top 10 Tricks for Making Your Playlists Rock
"If music is part of your everyday work routine, workout, or commute, stuffing your player full of tunes and hitting shuffle just won't cut it. Scan these 10 tips for improving and expanding your music playlists." - 20. Top 10 Outlook Boosters
"Outlook is such a fixture of office and computer life, its potential as a central life-organizing inbox is easily taken for granted. Empower your Outlook with these add-ons, link-ups, and data management techniques."
Want a quick blast from the past? Our most popular top 10s of 2008 and 2007 are just a click away.
Read More... [Source: Gizmodo: top]
Could the the PS3 Slim have been even slimmer? It could have, according to Sony's Masayuki Chatani, but it would've cost you. That word comes from a wide-ranging interview Chatani gave to Tech-On!, in which he revealed (seemingly for the first time) that Sony had considered using SSD drives or even network storage to further reduce the size of the console. SSD drives were ultimately rejected, as you might have guessed, due to cost reasons, and Chatani says that network storage ultimately proved to still be simply too impractical for a game console. He also said that the PS3 could have been made slimmer if Sony had just left the power supply on the outside, but that would have "imposed restrictions on transport and use, making it harder to use freely." Not a whole lot in the way of big revelations otherwise, but you can check out the complete interview at the link below.
Sony considered SSD, network storage for PS3 Slim originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 17:51:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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As recently as October, the conservative view of Barack Obama's foreign policy had little nuance: The president was seen as weak, apologetic, and deferential, someone who was voluntarily abandoning America's preeminent role as a world ...
Read More... [Source: Conservative - Google Blog Search]
Filed under: Downloads, Action, Trailers
Both comic book and video game fans knew this was coming, but the Joker will be making a grand return in a Batman: Arkham Asylum sequel (tentatively called Batman: Arkham Asylum 2). No longer content with taking over the facility with the worst inmate containment rating in history, it looks like the superpowered criminals are going to spread out into the city of Gotham and bring the Asylum to the to the citizens.
That's not all. Joker looks a little sick in the sequel, and we don't just mean sick in the head or full of infectious laughter. It's quite possible that one of his sadistic practical jokes may backfire on him this time. No other information outside of this teaser trailer is available, so we'll have to wait and see how things develop.
Download HD Batman: Arkham Asylum 2 Teaser Trailer (207 MB)
Batman sequel trailer breaks out of the Asylum originally appeared on Big Download Blog on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 12:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Congrats to the Conservative Blogs. 12 of 20. More Shameless Plugging. Ireland's Green Turns Blue. I am sure they will question who paid for the sign... If the Republican Senators are actually against "O.. ...
Read More... [Source: Conservative - Google Blog Search]
As for the next go 'round, he's looking to take a "tortoise and hare" approach when it comes to competing with Apple, who he himself claims "radically changed" the world around us when the App Store was introduced. As it stands, George sees the Ovi Store as a "jambalaya" of services, with Ben Wood -- an analyst at CCS Insight -- proclaiming that "none of those [work] properly." In the future, Ben has confessed that Ovi needs "to get all their ducks lined up, including hardware, software and services." So, what exactly will said ducks look like early next year? We're told that new features will include "in-application payments, a redesigned user interface that makes apps easier to discover and faster operation," and beyond that, the outfit is also looking to toss in recommendations based on the app purchases of their friends. This is definitely stirring stuff to hear from someone deep within Nokia's lairs, and it certainly makes us all the more excited to see what the next generation will bring. Nothing like a little competition in the market place to really light a fire up under someone's posterior, right?
Nokia taking Ovi Store criticism to heart, planning revamped version to rival App Store originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 09:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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A science fictional echo of his classic Generation X, Douglas Coupland's latest novel Generation A imagines a future where fuel is scarce and bees are extinct. Suddenly, five people are stung. Five people with strange molecules in their blood.
After Coupland published the groundbreaking novel Generation X in the early 1990s, surly speculative writer Kurt Vonnegut gave a grumpy speech to some college students in which he scoffed at the term "Generation X" and suggested that they should instead be called "Generation A" since they were "at the beginning of a series of astonishing triumphs and failures." Clearly, that comment is the inspiration for this novel.
Like all of Coupland's novels, Generation A is written in immediately engaging, genuinely funny prose. He's the kind of writer who calls GMO corn a "carb dildo" and gives one of his characters a hilarious obsession with the show Starblazers. Shuttling quickly between the first-person perspectives of his five bee-stung characters - from Sri Lanka to New Zealand - Coupland quickly sketches in a five-mintues-into-the-future world where everything is just a little bleaker than it is today. Transportation has gotten incredibly expensive due to impending peak oil, and everybody seems to have gotten hooked on an antidepressant called Solon that makes time seem to pass more quickly and calms people's fears of the future. And somehow, all the bees in the world have gone extinct, which means no more wildflowers, very little fruit, and (of course) no honey.
Still the world is recognizably our own, especially once it's made familiar to us via the goofy, heartfelt patter of Coupland's characters. Harj survived the Indian Ocean tsunami (but his family didn't) and now he works in a Sri Lankan call center for Abercrombie & Fitch. In his spare time, he's created a fake e-commerce website that sells "celebrity room tones" - audio files that capture what silence sounds like in rooms that famous people live in. Zack creates cock-and-ball-shaped crop circles in his own cornfields; Julien is obsessed with World of Warcraft; Samantha is obsessed with various geotagging games online (creating "earth sandwiches" by taking a picture of a piece of bread on the ground in New Zealand, while somebody across the globe in Spain takes a picture of another piece of bread on the ground); and Diana is an evangelical Christian with Tourette's. And all of them have one thing in common: After they're stung by supposedly-extinct bees, they're scooped up by a team of scientists and forced to undergo weird tests in an underground facility in Atlanta.
The setup for the novel is simply terrific, and the subtext is intriguing from the start. Flowing beneath the surface of this quirky eco-thriller is a meditation on the way media consumption has become both an addiction and form of redemption for our characters - and, by extension, the whole human species. Locked into their quarantine cells in Atlanta, the main characters aren't allowed to have any books, computer, or television. They're forced to contemplate how stark and freaky their lives would be without reading and engaging with the world through everything from music to World of Warcraft. What's particularly smart is the way Coupland makes no distinction between the addictive allure of reading and the distractions of the internet. All are, ultimately, ways of feeding our minds with a combination of beauty and "carb dildo" garbage.
Once the bee-stung are released, they discover they can't return to their old lives. Something about them has changed profoundly, and they need to come together and talk about it. So they accept an invitation from Serge, one of the scientists who studied them, to visit a remote island together where he can study them further - and they can get to know each other. It turns out what Serge really wants them to do is tell stories. He hints mysteriously that this is part of what he's researching, and that storytelling is related to why the bees chose to sting them. We also begin to realize that somehow this research is related to the drug Solon.
The entire second half of the novel is taken up with the stories that our characters tell teach other. Some are clearly based on their life experiences; others are parables about storytelling itself and the meaning of human connection. Taken together, these tales begin to form an organic whole, a portrait of people obsessed with finding the words to explain their experiences even while they are unable to find other people to share those experiences with. It's a risky and weird right-turn for the novel to take, though not unexpected for Coupland. He's known for his joyful experiments with language and form.
While most of the stories were amusing to read, I wound up feeling like this section of the novel was fairly uneven. There were simply too many stories, without any exposition between them, and we lost the thread of the compelling tale that Coupland had set up for us in the riveting first half of the novel. Though the book has a great ending, Coupland simply gets derailed when the characters tell stories instead of figuring out what connects them to each other and the bees. Arguably, storytelling is what connects them, and we get hints from very early in the book that there is a molecule called an "eon" that is released into the bloodstream when humans experience stories. But many readers will grow frustrated with Coupland's way of exploring this idea.
Despite these problems, this is one of the rare science fiction novels that will make you laugh out loud. Coupland's comic prose is simply terrific, but never in a way that feels cheap or mean. He's completely in love with his characters, and their weird observations about the world are achingly true. Regardless of whether you adore or ignore the storytelling half of the novel, you'll be amused and diverted. Especially if you've liked Coupland's other novels, you won't want to miss this one.
Read More... [Source: io9: top]
With the release so close, we expect more information to come out soon, starting with character art for all the bosses and the mysterious third character. We currently only know of the delightful Sheep Man and Commando Man.
Nintendo: Mega Man 10 teleporting down in March originally appeared on Joystiq on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 09:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read More... [Source: Joystiq]
Filed under: Citigroup
Citigroup (C) said Monday it is repaying $20 billion in bailout money it received from the Treasury Department, in an effort to reduce government influence over the banking giant.The New York-based bank was among the hardest hit by the credit crisis and rising loan defaults. It has received one of the largest bailouts of any bank during the financial crisis. The government gave it $45 billion in loans and agreed to protect losses on nearly $300 billion in risky investments.
Continue reading Citigroup to repay $20 billion in bailout money
Citigroup to repay $20 billion in bailout money originally appeared on DailyFinance on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 08:31:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Read More... [Source: DailyFinance]
She also called sales "frustrating, quite frankly," but declined to comment on Rockstar's marketing surrounding the release of the game. Dunaway remained diplomatic through the conversation though, only offering, "The old dynamic of 'throw it on television for a few weeks and then move on and forget it' just doesn't work," giving us little more than a taste of her real feelings behind the release's marketing push. Check out the whole clip after the break.
Continue reading Nintendo: GTA Chinatown Wars sales 'frustrating'
Nintendo: GTA Chinatown Wars sales 'frustrating' originally appeared on Joystiq on Wed, 09 Dec 2009 19:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read More... [Source: Joystiq [Nintendo]]
Filed under: Investing
Now that Goldman Sachs has forecast that 2010 will be a good year for stocks (and if they expected a lousy year, do you think they'd announce it or just quietly sell?), it's official: All four widely held asset classes -- stocks, bonds, precious metals and real estate -- are expected to continue rising in unison.The Fed has announced that interest rates will stay near-zero for the foreseeable future, bolstering bonds. Thanks to massive government support of the mortgage market, real estate has "turned the corner." And gold is believed by many analysts to be on its way to $1,350 at a minimum.
Continue reading Buy anything: 2010 should be a can't-lose year for investors
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Read More... [Source: DailyFinance]
Filed under: Interviews, Celebrities, Featured Stories
Born in Long Beach California, superstar MC and hip-hop artist Snoop Dogg got his start in the West Coast gangsta rap scene in the early '90s. After exploding into the rap world with Dr. Dre on The Chronic, Snoop Dogg spent his time creating some of the hottest tracks of the past decade, including 'Gin and Juice' and 'Drop It Like It's Hot,' while also finding time to star in films like 'Half-Baked,' 'Old School,' 'Training Day' and 'Bones.' (He even showed up on a Season 2 episode of 'Weeds.')
Snoop Dogg's highly-anticipated new album, the Teddy-Riley-produced 'Ego Trippin,' is out now. The first single, 'Sensual Seduction,' has been a huge success with its '70s-and-early-'80s-inspired vintage sound (and video).
We've also gathered from our various forays into celeb-studded video game events that Snoop Dogg is also huge gadget fan, so we sent him some questions, and he actually wrote us back. Read on to see Snoop Dogg's unexpurgated thoughts on the iPhone, Slingbox, and more.
What gadgets do you always bring with you to the set?
Mac, 360, iPhone, Sidekick, BlackBerry, Slingbox, chuuch
What cell phone do you have right now and what do you love/hate about it?
I use all 3 - iphone, blackberry, n sidekick
Who's the last person you sent a text message to and what was it about?
Teddy Riley and DJ Quik about qdt
Where do you go (site or service) pretty much every time you get online?
Youtube
What annoys you most about your iPod, cell phone, or laptop?
When they freeze up or when my sling box doesn't work overseas, ya dig?!?
Name one thing you wish your iPod/cellphone/laptop could do that it doesn't do now?
nuffin. They do it all
What upcoming gadget can you not wait to get your hands on?
Madden every year
You're stranded on a desert island: What gadget do you bring?
iPod - I got music n movies on it or def my sling box
What's the most-played song or artist on your iPod?
that's a tuff question.....
BlackBerry, Sidekick, or Treo?
BlackBerry and Sidekick.
Are you getting an iPhone-if so, why?
Just got one last week.
What's the longest time you've ever spent playing a video game in one sitting and what game was it?
Madden, couple hours, I always win the tournaments when we play on tour. That's why I be playin tha longest.
Do you use/have a Mac or PC? Why?
Mac, cuz they tha shit. I can do anything on it.
Related Links:
- Bill Gates Joins LinkedIn
- Best Ever Celebrity Gadget Ads
- Ruben Studdard, His BlackBerry, and His Return to American Idol
Snoop Dogg Is a Gadget Hound originally appeared on Switched on Thu, 10 Apr 2008 01:32:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Read More... [Source: Switched]
Filed under: People, Media, News Corp.
When we last checked in on Glenn Beck, the baby-faced conservative host was being credited as a "paid spokesman" for Goldline, a gold-coin vendor, even as his employer, News Corp.'s (NWS) Fox News, was saying its personalities aren't allowed to make product endorsements. Clearly, something had to change.And now something has. In response to inquiries from DailyFinance, Fox's legal department sent a letter to Beck's agent, George Hiltzik, laying out the network's position. Now, as The New York Times notes, Goldline has subtly reframed the nature of its relationship with Beck.
Continue reading Update: Glenn Beck no longer a 'paid spokesman' for Goldline
Update: Glenn Beck no longer a 'paid spokesman' for Goldline originally appeared on DailyFinance on Mon, 14 Dec 2009 10:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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