Top Issues for a President to me

Posted by JohnP 11/06/2007 at 19:55

Being elected President of the USA is serious, not a popularity contest like in High School. This seal reminds me of the honor required for this government office, in particular.

  1. Taxation – [[Fair Tax]]
  2. War on Terrorism – how do you negotiate with people that want you dead? You don’t.
  3. [[Term Limits|TermLimits]]
  4. Energy Policy – [[Thoughts On Energy]] Ethanol is a waste; Coal, Solar, Wind with government incentives; why isn’t drilling happening in ANWR, Alaska? Popular Mechanics Article
  5. [[Campaign Contributions]] – if you can’t vote in an election, then you shouldn’t be allowed to give money
  6. Health Care – More competition; posted costs for all work; less government interference; shopping across state lines and small biz/individuals placed into the same insurance "Group" so they don’t get screwed by insurance rates.
  7. Immigration – Fair is fair; no reward for breaking laws
    [[Thoughts on Immigration]]
    *
    [[Shortage of HiTech Workers in USA?]]
    **[[Saxby Update on Immigration August 2007]]
  8. [[Education]] – School Choice
  9. Abortion – ProLife/ProChoice
  10. Tort Reform – loser pays to prevent lawsuit abuse

Todo Tool - email xface

Posted by JohnP 11/04/2007 at 19:39

remember the milk

  • Manage tasks quickly and easily.
  • Get reminded anywhere
  • Locate your tasks
  • Share tasks – work together

Post-AT&T Todos

Posted by JohnP 11/01/2007 at 18:48

Some ideas for things to do after my contract ends at at&t:

[ ] Travel a little
[ ] Mooch off family when the money runs out!
[ ] Scrub the house clean
[ ] Clear the "back 40" of stumps
[ ] Practice PS2 and PS3 Gaming
[ ] Learn new job-related skills
[ ] Take some fun college classes
[ ] Learn Spanish
[ ] Learn Japanese
[ ] Redecorate the house
[ ] Become Entrepreneur
[ ] Create "secret project A"
[ ] Create "secret project B"
[ ] Create "secret project C"
[ ] Create "secret project D"
[ ] Market A, B, C, D and make $$$$
[ ] Catch up on Reading for fun
[ ] Catch up on reading for investments
[ ] Become a better stock investor
[ ] File for unemployment
[ ] Update Resume
[ ] Update living will, estate plan, power of attorney
[ ] Fix my WindowsXP PC that's been broken since 2006
[ ] and finally - look for a new job in 4-12 months, if needed
[x] Sleep
[x] Rest, Relax, Recoup
[x] Get healthier

Quicken 2008?

Posted by JohnP 10/31/2007 at 19:30

Ok, I upgraded my Quicken from 2006 Deluxe to 2008 Premium. I do this mainly to get access to new and better stock tracking tools.

  • I feel ripped off.
  • 2008 is slower
  • 2008 doesn’t appear to have anything in it that 2006 didn’t already have.
  • 2008 fonts are larger and I can’t find a way to make them smaller
  • 2008 wastes screen real estate for no reason I can figure out.
  • News story updates still don’t work.

A newby to Quicken will probably like the new look and feel, it feels easier and simpler. I’ve been using Quicken since 1990 – heck, I can probably find a text-only DOS version laying around here that does what I need.

RoR IDE?

Posted by JohnP 10/27/2007 at 16:39

I’m sold, use Netbeans 6+ for Ruby on Rails development.
A good book on the subject (get the 2nd edition)

ALINSKY's RULES FOR RADICALS

Posted by JohnP 10/27/2007 at 15:19

I came across this reading something on Hillary Clinton … here
"Personalize it"

Saul Alinsky’s rules of power tactics, excerpted from his 1971 book "Rules for Radicals: A Practical Primer for Realistic Radicals"

  1. Power is not only what you have but what the enemy thinks you have.
  2. Never go outside the experience of your people.
  3. Whenever possible go outside the experience of the enemy.
  4. Make the enemy live up to their own book of rules.
  5. Ridicule is man’s most potent weapon.
  6. A good tactic is one that your people enjoy.
  7. A tactic that drags on too long becomes a drag.
  8. Keep the pressure on.
  9. The threat is usually more terrifying than the thing itself.
  10. Maintain a constant pressure upon the opposition.
  11. If you push a negative hard and deep enough it will break through into its counterside.
  12. The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.
  13. Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.

Goodbye_ATT

Posted by JohnP 10/24/2007 at 08:31

My last day at at&t is/was 11/15. Sometimes you have to take big steps to move forward in life. I’ve decided to take this opportunity to do just that.

I won’t be able to say goodbye to most of the folks I’ve enjoyed working with these last 8+ years – first at BAPCO, BTSI, BTG and finally at&t. We’ve had some opportunities to excel and some fairly easy projects over that time.

As most of you know, I always worked to make it better or fix the process and finally, to endure it.

There are simply too many people to thank in AT&T and the telecom industry as a whole who helped me learn enterprise architecture, Telcordia systems and together we were successful in designing and deploying projects. Special ‘’SHOUT-OUT’’ to RonB, HarryMc, KeithF, almost all the cB Segment teams and a number of folks who have left already. Also I can’t forget the IDS, GPS and TechNet teams – thanks Ward, SteveMc and MarkS! Lunch guys, I’ll miss you too!

Please, throw me an email or connect with me via LinkedIn. It will be appreciated.

Should that email address stop working (spam is really bad), try guessing addresses using my name and/or initials and/or common UNIX accounts. You’ll probably find an aliases that will work.

Again, thanks to you all and feel free to look me up!

My plans for after AT&T Todos]].

webgen - ruby static website generator

Posted by JohnP 10/23/2007 at 19:54

Political Sites

Posted by JohnP 10/18/2007 at 19:47

Just a few Political Sites that I’ve come across:

  • http://www.prwatch.org/
  • http://www.sourcewatch.org/
  • http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Congresspedia
  • http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz.html
  • http://politifact.com/ – has the //True-o-meter//
  • http://boortz.com/
  • http://www.speakout.com/activism/issues/
  • http://www.weeklystandard.com/
  • http://politics1.com/

One-Time Passwords

Posted by JohnP 10/09/2007 at 19:08

Came across an old and interesting solution to login security … one-time passwords.
OTPW – A one-time password login package