4/18    Besides frontline what is good to watch online?
        \_ http://www.cspan.org
           Has cspan, cspan2, cspan3, cspan radio and archived bits from
           the various cspans.  All free.
        \_ http://Archive.org has a ton of "ephemeral films" free to download.

4/19    What's the proper way to write a phone number in the U.S. for someone
        outside the U.S. (in England)?   What exactly do they have to dial?

4/18    William Hung is the illegitimate love child of George W. Bush and an
        unnamed backwoods Arkansas crack dealer.
        \_ urlP?
           \_ Come on man- put 2 and 2 together.  They're both awkward in
              public.  They both have weird-looking eyes.  And they both act
              as though they have no idea of what most of the planet thinks
              of them.  Bush wasn't AWOL from the National Guard- it was
              paternity leave.  I'll leave the reverse photoshopping to you;
              we'll get Larry Flint to put up wanted posters throughout the
              Appalachians.
        \_ w00t!

4/18    http://www.nytimes.com/2004/04/17/international/middleeast/17BOOK.html
        "You're sure?" Mr. Powell is quoted as asking Mr. Bush in
        the Oval Office on Jan. 13, 2003, as the president told him he had
        made the decision to go forward. "You understand the consequences,"
        he is said to have stated in a half-question. "You know you're going
        to be owning this place?" ... In Mr. Woodward's account of the
        meeting between Mr. Bush and Mr. Powell in January 2003, the
        president is described as having simply informed the secretary of
        state of his decision to go to war in Iraq, as part of a 12-minute
        meeting in which Mr. Bush made a conscious decision not to ask Mr.
        Powell for advice. But, according to the book, Mr. Bush did ask Mr.
        Powell "Are you with me on this?" and told him, "I want you with
        me." Mr. Powell is quoted as having replied: "I'll do the best I
        can. Yes sir, I will support you. I'm with you, Mr. President."
        \_ How about getting the Saudi's to agree to manipulate oil prices
           in an attempt to influence an American election? Isn't that
           against the law?
           http://money.cnn.com/2004/04/19/news/international/election_saudi
        \_ I enjoyed Mr. Powell's rebuttal.  It amounted to, "What the crap?
           What kinda idiot IS Woodward?  I WORKED on that plan!"
           \_ Yes, Powell is discrediting Woodward's account: (dang -op)
              http://csua.org/u/6yp
              \_ Powell and Woodward went through exactly this a little over
                 10 years ago.  Woodward wrote an account of the Gulf War,
                 spun up Powell's role as a "reluctant warrior," created
                 lots of controversty, sold lots of books, and then was
                 slapped down by Powell, and when no one would listen,
                 by Bush Sr.  My source for this is Powell's autobiography.
              \_ Another silly question, what does this ending mean ^^^^
                 (dang -op)?  I couldn't finger either a dang or an op.
                 \_ "dang" as in "darn".  And -op means "from original poster".
                    \_ Wow, a kind and useful post on the motd!  You are a
                       man of great magnitude!  You have our gratitude!
              \_ All partisan politics aside, Powell has given so much for
                 this administration and has demonstrated a loyalty to this
                 country bigger than his pride.  I hope he lands on his feet
                 no matter which way the election goes. --erikred
                 \_ I also agree that Powell stayed in Dubya's lineup to make
                    sure he didn't fuck things up as much as Bush Jr. could.
        \_ I really feel sorry for Powell. He's had to deal with a lot of
           shit when instead he could have had a great tour

4/18    Anyone add in memory to a PC lately? Do DDR memory sticks have to be
        symmetric on modern mbs? I seem to recall that I've added in memory
        in the past that was non-symmetric and it worked. Or is this one of
        those "it depends on the mb" questions?
        \_ By symmetric, do you mean "matched in capacity" or are you refering
           to physical symmetry.
           \_Matched capacity and speed of RAM(Access time).
        \_ I built a Pentium 4 2.8 GHz system a couple months ago using an Asus
           motherboard, and the manual said something about a matched DDR
           pair giving you two channels -- you could use just one DIMM, but
           then it would be one channel.  Go download the manual, the mobo
           was P4800 or something.
        \_ You just have to set up the PC to work at the slowest common
           denominator for timings. The capacity wouldn't normally have
           to be the same but they probably do for dual-channel operation.
           \_ Well, what I did was I got this cheapie PC to run simulations on.
              It's an Athlon 2400 or something. It had two sticks of 128 in it.
              I got a stick of 512 DDR and replaced one of the sticks, the mb
              only had two slots for RAM. When I booted it only detected 128.
              If I throw out the other stick I get 512. I guess the PC is too
              crappy for assymetric, but it seems weird because it runs fine
              with one stick of RAM on it. The two original sticks of 128 do
              not match, btw.

4/19    Anyone know a place in the bay area that will buy used RAM modules?
        I've got a couple of 128 and 256 SODIMMS I don't need anymore.
        \_ "The Used Computer Store" will give you a shiny nickel for them.
           You might want to try eBay.
           \_ Nah, I don't want to go through the trouble of ebay. There
              used to be places where you could sell slightly used RAM.
           \_ UCS: scummy scammers who only survive due to freshman/student
              churn.
        \_ Is your 128MB chip PC66?

4/19    Bush makes $700k last year, pays about $200k in taxes.  Cheney
        makes 1.5 million, pays $200k in taxes.  How does this work exactly?
        Seems like this directly contradicts what even the Cato Institute calls
        the "bedrock principle of taxation" in America.
        \_ Because different income sources are taxed at different rates.  I'm
           stunned that no one on the motd seems aware of this trivial fact
           and instead prefers to go off on conspiracy theories and pseudo
           marxist drivel.  Put away the tinfoil.
           \- Once again, read this book "Perfectly Legal":
                http://csua.org/u/6yv
              Written by a Republican, not a Marxist. --psb
              The different sources of income is partly a non-issue because
              the people we are really talking about are making the big
              bucks on some form of investment income [i.e. trading
              risk and time for reward] not wage [trading calories and
              time for money]. In other words we *are* talking about
              differential tax treatment of income. And we are challenging
              the equity and efficiency of the current system. We're talking
              about examining the descriptive consequences and considering
              normative issues. --psb
              \_ What's wrong with trading risk instead of calories?  Is the
                 sweat of one's brow the only worth a person has?  How about
                 other ways of measuring value such as the fact that a person
                 with a higher education will have a higher earning capacity
                 than one with a lower education?  Or smarter vs. dumber?  Or
                 any number of other ways?  Calories are not measured evenly
                 across the economy.  Is that unfair?  I don't think so.  Some
                 calories are worth more than others.
                          \- i'm not saying everyone should make the same
                             hourly wage. the issue is the tax exemptions
                             not the tax schedule. --psb
                 \_ Your argument might hold water if income from calories
                    burned was taxed at an equitable, or even an equal, rate
                    as that from risk.  "Risk money" has had its taxes reduced
                    immensely over the last few decades, and very wrongly so.
                    The estate, dividend, and capital tax reductions tend
                    toward consolidation into massive hereditary fortunes that
                    look suspiciously like the monarchies we threw off more
                    than 200 years ago.
                 \- because wage income is deducted from your paycheck so
                    it is harder to hide. next, companies are less willing
                    to play games to the tax advantage of the avg shlub making
                    $150k/yr, but probably is for the person making $15m.
                    a bus driver obviously cant arrange to be paid minimum
                    wage and then fly off to bermuda to give a talk as a
                    "transportation consultant" in a bar over a red stripe
                    or two and get paid $25k which goes into a bermudan
                    bank which then gives him a visa card to access that
                    account ... all invisible to the IRS. --psb
              \_ How come sometimes you can't spell?
                 \- because english is my second language.
                    \_ BS.  This post was well-thought and spelled
                       perfectly.  Other times you barely deign to press
                       the space bar.  It's odd.  Are there 2 of you?
                         \- my brother, esb, helped me compose that entry.
                            he is knowing much english than i. --psb
                            \_ Extra Special Bannerjee?
                       \_  Wait a minute.  You've been regularly reading psb's
                           posts on the motd, and that's the only thing you
                           find odd?  I think you're pretty odd for thinking
                           that.

4/18    Saudis want Kerry to win, raise oil prices.. hmm. this
        means I definately will vote for Bush
        \_ I need first learn spelling and gramar also
           \_ Bush no care grammer, Bush everyday man
        \_ Ironic since Republicans were pissed recently about foreigners
           rooting for Kerry and that only Americans should decide our
           President.
           \_ Also ironic since an article on CNN that directly contradicts this
              baseless assertion keeps getting censored:
              http://money.cnn.com/2004/04/19/news/international/election_saudi
              \_ CNN has a new article on the front page where the
                 Administration refutes this.
                 \_ And we all know how this Administration ALWAYS tells the
                    truth.
                    \_ Bush wants to keep oil prices down to keep the economy
                       humming, exerts pressure on Saudi Arabia.  Election
                       effects are a side effect; Saudis fall in line to
                       Bush's strong leadership.  Saudi rep misspeaks when he
                       says the primary purpose is the election.
                       \_ Keep towing that line!
                          \_ Apparently 51% +/- 4% of Americans do, and if
                             this trend holds, Bush will be your President
                             for 2004-2008.
                             \_ If the upcoming election for president
                                were held today, for whom would you
                                vote?
                                John Kerry (D) 49%
                                George W. Bush (R) 45%
                                Undecided 6%
                                Source: Knowledge Networks / Program
                                on International Policy Attitudes
                                \_ Check http://cnn.com and http://washingtonpost.com for
                                   new data, boy-o
                                   \_ that's dated 4/19.
                                      \_ I am surprised to see that.  Anyway,
                                         so are the CNN/USA Today/Gallup and
                                         the Washington Post polls, and
                                         they're much more well known.  The
                                         other one I found on some strange
                                         Canadian site via google.
                                         \_ Looks pretty even to me:
                                            http://www.pollingreport.com
                                            \_ That's because the page is
                                               showing the Zogby data, which
                                               is the only major one that
                                               shows Kerry ahead, and is
                                               also current to 1 week.
                                               Even so, CNN/USA Today/Gallup
                                               and Wash Post > Zogby
                                               http://www.pollingreport.com/wh04gen.htm
                             \_ What happened to "I predict that Bush will
                                win California and the presidency in a
                                landslide" of three months ago? How's that
                                prediction working out for you?
                          \_ It's "toeing the line".
                       \_ So why not do it 6 months ago? a year ago?
                          http://www.ioga.com/Special/crudeoil_Hist.htm
                       \_ LEADERSHIP STRONG!

4/18    How are the bayes_seen and bayes_toks files updated in my homedir?
        (I filter my mail through spamc).
        \_ spamd changes to your uid and updates them.  This assumes that
           bayes_auto_learn is turned on in spamassassin's
           configuration file, and that a piece of spam is above the
           bayes_auto_learn_threshold_spam value or, conversely, a piece of
           nonspam is below the bayes_auto_learn_threshold_nonspam value.
           If they're not set to your liking in the systemwide spamassassin
           configuration file, you can turn them on in your
           ~/.spamassassin/user_prefs file.  Of course, auto learning doesn't
           do much good since it's only going to learn stuff that is
           *definitely* spam or *definitely* not spam, and spamassassin
           can already identify those.  Consider manually running
           sa-learn --spam on your spam folder if you have one,
           and sa-learn --ham on your non-spam folders.  It really helps.
           -dans

4/19    Which show is the most irreverent? Southpark, Simpsons, or Shapelle's?
        \_ Chappelle?

4/19    Why is this not all over the news.
        Jordan King says WMD Vx gas attack stopped. Al Qaeda/Syrian
        connection suspected.
        http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1120805/posts

4/19    http://washingtonpost.com has an excerpt from Plan of Attack.  Powell
        being "out of the loop" aside, you can read about the Cheney-Powell
        dynamic.

4/19    Hehe, here it comes... Kofi going down for bogus Iraqi oil for food
        scam.