I’m A Super.com

On Saturday, November 22nd, Gail Collins and the New York Times printed an Op/Ed piece entitled “Time For Him To Go”.

The article goes over several reasons why the author believes George W. Bush is essentially incapable of governing effectively, and recommends two resignations occur so that an unconstitional extension of power can be given to Barack Obama.

Let’s take a look at my favorite quote in the article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/22/opinion/22collins.html?_r=3

Putting Barack Obama in charge immediately isn’t impossible. Dick Cheney, obviously, would have to quit as well as Bush. In fact, just to be on the safe side, the vice president ought to turn in his resignation first. (We’re desperate, but not crazy.) Then House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would become president until Jan. 20. Obviously, she’d defer to her party’s incoming chief executive, and Barack Obama could begin governing.

Where do I begin? The article itself is actually really quite infuriating. But the most infuriating part is this womans desire to completely undermine the Constitution, and in my opinion, power of the people. The best part of this line? Let me reiterate in case you missed it:

“Obviously, she’d defer to her party’s incoming chief executive, and Barack Obama could begin governing”.

So, in a new level of unconstitutional party politics, Pelosi would give presidential power to a person who is not yet in office so they could ‘begin governing’. Wow. What an incredible concept. Not only that, but the whole aire of the comment is classic. 

And let’s not forget another good part, “Obivously, she’d defer to her party’s…” - Yes, she’d obviously defer power to her party. You know, because naturally the power of the party is so strong that despite the chain of command established by our Constitution, the party’s desires really should take precedence.

And then people wonder why I’m so incredibly uncomfortable with the concept of a Single-Party Congress, Senate, and President. But that’s another topic.

As a bonus, the Pelosi presidency would put a woman in the White House this year after all. On the downside, a few right-wing talk-show hosts might succumb to apoplexy. That would, of course, be terrible, but I’m afraid we might have to take the risk in the name of a greater good.

Yes! As a bonus we can achieve yet another social milestone that really shouldn’t matter anyway. But since the presidency is a childish game of school-yard politics, let’s make sure that we get a woman in their to boot! Regardless of her ability to govern.

But then again, her ability to govern doesn’t really matter anway. Obviously the power to govern would be given to Barack Obama.

1. Sound in Space

The tag line from Alien got it right: “In Space, no one can hear you scream”. The reason no one can hear you scream is that sound needs air to travel in, and there’s none in Space. Most of space is a hard vacuum, with a molecule or two of hydrogen floating around in every cubic meter– not nearly enough to transmit sound. Every sound in the movies, from photon torpedoes and laser beams to exploding starships and hyperpace booms, would never happen in real life. For that matter, you’d never see laser beams in space either, since in a vacuum there’s no medium to reveal them. So a real-life Laser dog fight in space would be really boring to watch.

2. Faster-than-light Travel
Warp drives and hyperspace are very useful in science fiction, but there’s one catch. According to Einstein, the speed of light isn’t just a good idea, it’s the law. Nothing can go faster than the speed of light in a vaccum (That’s about 186,000 miles per second). Even inching toward the speed of light is difficult — immense energy is required to get to even a fraction of the speed of light, and the closer you get to the speed of light, the more energy required. The amount of energy you’d need to achieve the speed of light is inifinite ( i.e., more than you’ve got. even with those Super cool long-lasting batteries). So just tossing in a few more dilithium crystals into the warp drives isn’t going to make it happen.

There are loopholes in our understanding of the physics that make faster-than-light travel theoretically possible. For example, it’s theoretically possible to create a “bubble” of space that breaks itself off from other space and moves faster than light relative to that space (all the while everything inside both “spaces” moves no faster than the speed of light).

This is known as an Alcubierre Warp Bubble. The Catch (There had to be one) is that these bubbles require the existance of exotice matter that has negative energy, and wouldn’t you know, there isn’t really any lying around, and it’s not clear that any actually exists.

3. Laser Bolts you can dodge
Aside from the issue of Imperial Storm Troopers being bad shots, let’s review a fundemental fact of light (Which is what lasers are): It travels at 186,000 Miles per second. so the idea of ducking before the laser hits you is just plain silly. Not to mention (of course) the idea of a laser bolt being visible as a streak that has a beginning, a middle, and an end. If you were zapped by a laser from a laser gun, it would look like a single stream of light, with one end attached to the barrel of said gun, and the end attached to whatever portion of your head had not melted yet, assuming you’re having a laser battle somewhere where there is enough air around to illuminate the entire beam. Most “laser” beams in science fiction movies travel slower than bullets do today. Let’s see Obi Wan whip his light saber around fast eonugh to stop the spray of a mac 10 (and let’s not even begin ot talk about all the things wrong with a sword made of light).

4. Human-looking Aliens
this is endemic on the various Star Trek series, where creatures from entirely different sectors of the Universe look just like Humans except for the ocasional buldging ridge on their foreheads. Yes, this is the result of having only humans at casting calls. But in a large sense, all these “humanoid” variations aint gonna’ happen. Look, humans evolved on earth and shared a basic body format (four limbs, 1 head, side to side symmetry) with just about every other vertebrate on the planet. It’s a form that works fine for this planet, but not even every vertebrate sticks with it (See: Snakes, whales, seals, etc). Given that any planet with life on it will have that life evolve in it’s own way, the chances of the universe being stocked with chesty alien princesses who crave who human starship captains is slim at best.

Related to this is the following.

5. Half-Breed Aliens
Humans don’t even interbreed with other species here on earth. Our DNA is simply too different from other species to allow such a mating to produce offspring. Given this, what are the chances of successful mating with an alien species that may not even have DNA as it’s genetic encoding medium? Also going back to the idea that aliens probably won’t look like Humans, how would you do it anyway? It’s not exactly the “insert tab A Into Slot B” proposition it would be here at home.

6. Brain-Sucking Aliens
Ditto Aliens that control your body by using your brains, or gestate in your chest, or what not. Let’s posit that any creature that controls the brain of any other creature (Not that any exist here on earth) does so only after a few million years of what’s called “speciation”– I.e., One species enters a symbiotic relationship with another species. This relationship would have to be pretty specific, as symbiotic relationships are here on earth. Which is to say just becuase you’re in a symbiotic relationship with one species doesn’t mean it transfer over to another species, especially an alien species, who’s body chemistry, DNA, brain wiring, etc., isn’t even remotely close to your own .So don’t worry about the “puppet master” scenario too much, or that you’ll be nothing more than a glorified egg sac for some nasty breed of space monster.

7. Shape-shifting Aliens
Shape-changing aliens are all very well, but there’s a tiny problem in having a roughly human sized lump of alien protoplasm turning itself into, say, a rat, to scurry around in the ventilation shaft: Where does rest of the alien go? You can’t just make 99% of your mass dissapear into thin air ( or reappear, as the case may be); It has to go somewhere. Unless that “rat” is running around with a highly compressed mass of a human-sized object (Which presents it’s own problems), Shape-shifting in to different sized objects is not very likely (One of the smart things about terminator 2 was that the T-1000 only shape shifted into things of roughly the same mass, like human beings, or a floor).

8. Time Travel
Got an itch to spend time in the Arthurian England? Or perhaps Gettysburg during the Civil War? The same relativistic principles that keep us from going faster than light also keep us rom traveling backward in time and messing with the past. It’s possible to slow down time — the closer you get to the speed of light, the slower time moves for you relative to your original frame of reference — but to get the clock spinning in the other direciton would require you to go faster than light, and you can’t do that. Again, there are theoretical loopholes that could allow it — worm holes, actually, wich are “tunnels” in the fabric of space-time that could possibly allow travel back in time. but once again, keeping these wormholes open would require exotic matter with negative energy. Got Any? Neither do we.

9. The Planetary Sameness Principle
The desert planet of Tatooine. The ice planet of Hoth. The Jungle Planet of Dagobah. What do these planets all have in common? One planetary-wide ecosystem. Which isn’t too likely. Our own planet has varying zones and ecological areas: Desert, Tundra, Jungle, and so on; other planets in the system also show marked zones of varying atmospheric and weather patterns. mars has ice caps as well as (relatively) temperate zones; Jupiter has distinct weather sytems based in different areas on it’s globe. The planets that show a sameness are the ones we couldn’t live on. Venus is all desert, but that’s becase a runaway greenhouse effect makes it hot enough to melt lead. Pluto is all ice, but it’s so far away from the Sun that its atmosphere freezes for most of its orbit. There may well be purely desert or jungle planets, but most planets we’d want to live on would probably be able to accomondate both.

10. The Planetary Gravity Scam
Everywhere you go in science fiction, people are walking around like they weigh just what they do on Earth. Chances of that happening in the real universe? Slim. Consider our own Solar System. On Mars, a 180-Pound man would weigh just 70 pounds; on Jupiter, 424 Pounds (not that you can walk on Jupiter, as it has no solid surface). That man on the moon? Just 30 pounds. The man’s mass is the same, it’s just that different planets have different gravitational pulls. The idea that all the planets that humans might visit would exactly match Earth’s own gravitational profile is a little much. As is, alternately, the idea that all alien creatures would be as comfortable in our gravitational field as we are.

From”Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Plunges into the Universe“… one of my favorite bathroom books. Thanks to Bathroom Reader for permission.

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=4847389
Beer companies paying for consumers’ groceries
November 19th, 2008 @ 10:14pm
By Courtney Orton
Your next trip to the grocery store could cost you nothing, thanks to beer companies. Tonight we have information on how to shop on beer companies’ tabs.

Jaclyn England You don’t have to drink it. You don’t even have to buy it. But you do have to find a beer rebate to start getting checks in the mail from beer companies.

It’s a discovery Jaclyn England made a year ago when she found a stack of beer rebates at the grocery store.

“Some of them say: ‘You must purchase this such-and-such beer.’ But the great thing about Utah is that it says: ‘No beer purchase required in the state of Utah,’” England explained.

England started using them, and she’s been getting money in the mail ever since. “Frequently, I’ll tell my husband, ‘Tonight’s dinner is sponsored to us in part by Bud.’ Because Budweiser buys our food half the time,” she said.

Pizza, crab legs, chicken wings, deli meats and cheeses, sandwiches, bottled water; you name it, as long as it shows up on a beer rebate, England throws it in her cart.

“You can get kind of creative with it. You can get like a Papa Murphy’s take-and-bake, or like the rotisserie chickens from Costco, places like that; and as long as you’re spending at least $15 worth, you get $15 back,” England explained.

The beer companies are banking that if you’re buying those items, you’ll also be buying some brew.

“What they’re doing is linking their beer brand with other really positive things that you might do to celebrate: a football game, a party, a holiday,” said Peggy Lander, with Richter7 advertising.

It’s easier than couponing, and there’s no cutting and no clipping. “There’s no looking for this specific brand and making sure that you’re buying the right size and the right brand. It’s anything you want,” England said.

The rebates aren’t always where you’ll notice them. “Most of us breeze right by them. But if you keep your eyes open, you can get a lot of great deals and a lot of free items,” England said.

Most of the time they’re not in the beer aisle. “They’re usually on a display. There’s usually a stack of beer and then a poster with them on there,” England said.

England says she gets $50 to $200 worth of free food a month, and she finds other rebates that save her even more money every month. Find out what those are tomorrow morning at 6:00 on Eyewitness News Today.

E-mail: corton@ksl.com

This is definitely one of those Utah things. People who are taking advantage of this “opportunity” are simply lying to themselves. Talk about ripping people off.

Don’t get me wrong, there is absolutely nothing wrong with taking advantage of a legitimate offer from a corporation. even if that legitimate offer seems “too good to be true”. Companies create those kinds of deals because no matter how sweet the deal, they know they’re getting more sales, more recognition and more loyalty. So taking advantage is no big deal.

But taking advantage when you’re the type of person who has absolutely no intention of ever purchasing their product? I may be assuming a lot, but my assumption is that the lady in the article, and likely many of the Utahns that would take advantage of this fantastic offer would never have any reason to purchase beer or other related alcohol products.

And if that’s the case, talk about ripping cold hard cash right out from the beer companies fingers. You can justify it all you want: the beer companies are evil and are just using this tactic to get our money. That was one comment on KSL’s article comment board. But the reality is, they give something in hopes that from a lot of people, they’ll get something in return. If you’re certain you’ll never take advantage of their products/services, and you repeatedly take them for $50-$200 bucks a month, you’re a thief.

Many employers and schools these days monitor their employee’s internet and messaging activity in an effort to increase productivity, among other reasons. While I don’t think their actions are necessarily inappropriate, I don’t think the IT manager at work really needs to know how many times I check my G-Mail account, or which RSS feeds I read. In this tutorial, I’ll show you how to protect your browsing, email, and messaging from prying eyes, no matter where in the world you are, or how elite their configuration is.

You can also use this tutorial to create a safe, encrypted connection when you’re on the road, and have to use a public, unencrypted wifi connection, but don’t want prying eyes to see what sites you’re visiting, or what your credit card number is. All of your data will be safe, and what you do on your breaks or lunch is hidden from people who really don’t need to know that you’re looking for a world of warcraft party in your area, or an alcoholics anonymous meeting.

Quick Summary:

We’ll be creating a windows based proxy server at your home that uses an SSH Encrypted connection, that will tunnel all of your email, messaging, and browsing traffic. Essentially this means every request your computer makes will be wrapped up in an encrypted package and sent to your home. From there, your home will make the request for you (hence proxy), get the web page you were looking for, wrap it up, and send it back to you in the same encrypted format. No matter who was watching the lines, all they’ll see is an encrypted data stream, not the data, or even what you were trying to get.

Advanced users: Bullet Points throughout the article show core steps that need to be taken, without the fluff.

What you need:

1. A Computer (I use a 12 year old Celeron 700 mhz machine) at your
2. An internet connection at home
3. Some intermediate computer experience

Step 1: Install SSH on your “server”

SSH is an encryption technology that allows information to be transmitted from point A to point B in an encrypted manner. It’s capable of wrapping up pretty much any type of data, which is why it’s so useful here.

• Make sure the Windows user on your server computer is password protected
• Be logged in as that user for the rest of this tutorial
• Download OpenSSH For Windows, and install it:

SSH from SourceForge:
http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=103886&package_id=111688

• Open up a Windows Command Prompt and issue the following commands (including the %’s):

cd \program files\openssh

mkgroup -l >> etc\group

mkpasswd -l -u %username% >> etc\passwd

net start opensshd

The commands above created an SSH user for the Windows User you were logged in as, with that same password. Then it makes OpenSSH a service that it starts whenever you turn on your computer.

Step 2: Install your “Proxy Server’ who will act on your behalf

The proxy server is the piece of software that acts as the middleman for you. You ask your proxy for a web page (privately through the SSH tunnel we just installed), he then goes and gets the web page for you, sends it back via that same secret, private, hidden tunnel).

I’ve seen a couple of articles talking about home based proxy servers, but most of them cost $$$. Well, I’m not a fan of paying for stuff. The best solution I’ve found is FreeProxy, by HandCraftedSoftware. It’s not open source, but it doesn’t cost a dime, and I like that.

• Download FreeProxy and Install it:

FreeProxy, by HandCrafted Software:

http://www.handcraftedsoftware.org/index.php?page=4&action=file&file_id=5

• Download FreeProxy Configuration here.

Now that we’ve installed FreeProxy, we need to tell it what type of content to listen for. Fortunately, I’ve done that for you. Download the configuration file above.

• Import Configuration 
  • Open FreeProxy Control Center
  • File > Open > Open ImASupercomProxyConfig.cfg
  • File > Save

 

• Install FreeProxy as a Service:
  • Start/Stop Menu > Service Mode > Start

Step 3: Configure your Windows Firewall and Router

Windows and your router both block all but the most common ports by default. you’ll need to free up port 22 on both your router and Firewall.

In addition, you’ll need to turn on “port Fowarding” for your router or DSL modem. Forward port 22 to your Proxy Server (The machine we’ve been working on). I wish I could give you detailed instruction here, but every router is different. This is where those “intermediate computer skills” come in handy.

Step 4: install and Configure Putty Tray

Putty Tray is an extension to the Putty SSH client. Essentially, Putty will take all of the requests that your Web Browser/Instant Messenger makes, and forward them to your proxy server at home, wrapping them in SSH along the way. I use Putty Tray instead of Putty because when you minimize it, it tucks itself away in the system tray.

• Download Putty Tray here.

Putty Tray doesn’t need to be installed. Just save that file where you can always get to it.

• Add listening Ports to Putty

Connections > SSH> Tunnels

Add Destination localhost:8080 and Source Port 80

Add Destination localhost:443 and Source Port 443

Add Destination localhost:1080 and Source Port 1080

• Save your changes, and connect to your server with Putty Tray
  • Putty Configuration > Session > Load, Save or delete a stored session
    Save your putty session so that you don’t need to make these configuration changes again.
  • Enter your home IP address in the Host Name field.
    if you don’t know your home IP, you can always get it by going to whatismyip.com. Make sure you know your IP address before you leave home.
  • Check the SSH radio button, and click Open

You’ll be prompted to accept an SSH certificate. Go ahead and do it and then login with your usual Windows login and password (The one you were using when you installed the OpenSSH server in Step 1).

Step 5: Tell your Programs to use your Tunnel

Now you just need to tell your programs to use your SSH tunnel, rather than the open internet connection they would normally. This is done by telling it to use a Proxy Server. Each program is a little different, but most network-useable applications should have a connections Settings page, or Network settings page, that allows you to specify a proxy server to use. Here are some common ones:

When configuring programs, they’ll all use this information:

http server: localhost Port: 80

https server: localhost Port: 80

SOCKS5 server: localhost Port: 1080

you can use the settings above to configure your favorite applications like so:

FireFox:

Tools > Options > General > Connection Settings > Manual Proxy Configuration

Internet Explorer:

Tools > Internet Options > Connections tab > Lan settings > Use Proxy Server for your LAN

Windows Live Messenger:

Tools > Options > Connections > Advanced Settings

That’s all there is to it. Now every request that your browser or Messenger makes will be forwarded to your home first, and then back to you. All information to and from your house will be encrypted. there are draw backs. Your connection could be a little or a lot slower, depending on how fast your home internet connection is. But that’s a small price to pay for privacy, and peace of mind when you’re on the road!

Remember that your ’server’ must be on in order for you to use it as a secure proxy, and Putty must be open and connected.

What I’ve done is set up Opera to always be configured with my proxy. So I use Opera when I need “secure browsing” and I use IE or Firefox when I don’t care. Talk about the best of both worlds.

After it was announced that the word “Meh” was being introduced into next years Collins English Dictionary, I was determined to find out in which Simpsons episode and season the word was first used.

It was difficult for me to find where Meh is first used in the Simpsons, so I thought I’d share it with everyone.

The first mention is in The Simpsons, season 6, Episode 2F15.

Marge: [weaving on a loom]Hi Bart, I’m weaving on a loom!
Bart:Meh.

It is used again in The Simpsons, Season 12, Episode CABF09.

Homer: Kids… how would you… like to go to… Blocko Land??
Lisa/Bart: Meh.
Homer: But … the TV gave me the impression that …
Bart: We said “meh”.
Lisa: M-e-h. Meh.

There may be other references. Feel free to comment - if you have a Youtube URL, I’ll happy include them here.