Captain Digital

Random musings on politics, society, and pop culture from the Internet's marketing curmudgeon.

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Archives for 2009

Got MLK?

Today our country celebrates/commemorates/observes the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr. Coincidentally, it’s the last day of the Bush Administration, and the Eve of the ObamaNation. (Ahem.) The Chosen One has been busy in the last two weeks, with his faithful media lapdogs casting him as a combination of the second comings of Martin Luther King, Jr., Abraham Lincoln, and Jesus Christ. Pretty big boots to step into, if you ask me, but the media assures us that he’s up to the task. We’ve been treated to breathless stories of how Obama has but four years to “fix” global warming or we’re all doomed, and how the Messiah is going to undo eight years of the “evils” of the Republicans.

I find it interesting that everything Obama has done so far, has been of a symbolic nature. [Read more…] about Got MLK?

A Challenge. A Real Challenge.

Sorry I’ve been a bit distant of late…I’ve been working (feverishly) on wrapping up the crafting of a business plan for the Amarillo EnterPrize Challenge. It’s a yearly contest to find – and fund – a number of worthy entrepreneurs’ ideas. I have one (www.guitarfurniture.com) that’s in the running. The winners will be announced in late March.

This is a big honkin’ deal, people…the winners will receive a check for $75,000. (!) If my idea is selected, it means that I could, in one fell swoop (or one swell foop) get enough funding to launch our products, and not have to go out and get a loan or shill for angel funding. That’s HUGE. So I hope you’ll forgive me if I’ve been a little lax in posting to the ol’ blogs.

The contest deadline is Monday at 5PM, so bear with me, please.

Reliving life through my daughter’s eyes.

Being a dad is the coolest thing I’ve ever gotten to do. Cooler than playing drums with a big band. Cooler than meeting the President. Cooler than getting published. Cooler than winning some big award for design. I’d trade every experience I’ve ever had, if that’s what it would take to keep being my daughter’s father. It’s that big of a deal. [Read more…] about Reliving life through my daughter’s eyes.

GreenWatch: When Theory Trumps Reality.

Before we get started, let me state for the record, that I am not a scientist (nor do I play one on TV). I am, however, a thinker (with apologies to Glenn Beck), and I have been trained almost since birth (thanks, Dad!) to think things through. I don’t like to take things at face value, and I prefer to question conventional wisdom.

That’s why I believe that all this talk about “global warming” and “climate change” is complete and utter bull.

(I’d use a much more explicit word, but this is a family blog.)

The problem I see here is that the green crowd have combined a rush to judgement, bad intel, skewed data, hidden agendas, and a sense of hysteria into a perfect storm. If these nutjobs only hurt themselves, it would all be simply amusing. Unfortunately, they are not content to play Chicken Little to the world. No, they’re doing their best to screw up everything they can, all in the name of an imaginary problem over which we’d have no control, even if we DID cause it.

I don’t want to get too far into this nonsense, but if you were to take AlGore’s premise at face value, and have the USA sign onto the ludicrous Kyoto Protocol, by their own admissions,  we would only change our global climate something like 2/10ths of one percent. That means we’d be just as well off doing nothing, for those of you keeping score.

Here’s a prime example of the kind of twisted thinking that will kill us all: [Read more…] about GreenWatch: When Theory Trumps Reality.

Read All About It.

I hear that the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, like many other once-proud newspapers, is up for sale. Even worse, if it’s not sold inside of 60 days, it will cease to exist in print (but might continue in a greatly scaled-back online form).

Sad. Very sad.

I was thinking the other day about how the newspaper biz has changed since I was a kid, throwing a paper route in Shreveport, Louisiana. It’s changed a lot – and not for the better. Of course, you could argue, and many do, that the Internet killed the Newspaper, just like it’s kill(ing) CDs and will soon kill DVDs. But if you’ve ever tried to get all your information from the web, you’ve probably seen that there’s something that you lose, when you ditch paper. So, I’m not convinced the problem with newspapers lies at the feet of the World Wide Web alone. No, I think it’s something(s) much deeper, and will, in fact, cause the destruction of an entire industry in no less significant a way than what happened to the dinosaurs. [Read more…] about Read All About It.

Blago goes Ballistic.

Overlooked in the brouhaha over Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich is what his imminent defrocking will do to the Gun Rights vs. Gun Control debate.

What a lot of people don’t realize is that G-Rod and his cronies in the Illinois legislature have been at the forefront of those that are trying their best to legislate private ownership of guns out of existence. Illinois boasts a disproportionately large number of firearms manufacturers.Despite the fact that most voters in Illinois are pro-gun, G-Rod and his pals have consistently voted against any and all bills that would make it possible for citizens in the state to own guns for their own protection. Even worse, G-Rod has been positively rabid, trying to pass laws that would effectively make it impossible for gun manufacturers to operate legally within the state. For instance, they’ve tried to pass laws that would forbid the manufacture, transportation, and sale of high-capacity magazines for handguns. Pull that off, and you put every Illinois manufacturer at an impossible to overcome disadvantage in comparison to their non-Illinois based competitors. [Read more…] about Blago goes Ballistic.

Homeland (In)security.

Living in Texas, I’ve given a lot of thought on the issue of homeland security, especially as it applies to the border. Admittedly, here in the Panhandle, we’re about as far away from the Mexican border as you can be, and still live in the great State of Texas. However, you might be surprised to learn that border security is an issue that has a direct effect on where I live. For instance, while the majority of the population in the Texas Panhandle is Anglo/White/Caucasian (I’m not up on what the P.C. crowd is calling us homies nowadays), the second-largest ethnic group is not Black/Afro-American/Whatever is the P.C. Term, but Hispanic. A surprisingly large percentage of our local population is comprised of those who have entered the company without the benefit of immigration papers. In other words, illegal aliens. (I’m aware the P.C. term is “undocumented workers.” That’s a load of male bovine excrement. If they are from another country and are here without following our immigration laws, they are illegal aliens.

You may have noticed in the news lately, that illegal alien immigration is way down in the past fiscal quarter. I’d love to be able to report that this is due to stepped-up patrols, the long-awaited, controversial border fence, or something we did to directly affect the problem. Nope. It’s because our economy (like the rest of the world’s, mind you) is in the baño right now. (For you gringos, that’s the toilet.) Seems as though all those low-paying jobs that are typically beneath the dignity of us naitive-borns are suddenly looking muy bueno right about now, and the depressed job market has not the siren song call to our Neighbors to the South.

Still, we need border security, to serve both economic security and national security goals. I think I have the answer, and – with appologies to Jonathan Swift – I’d like to share my idea with you.

Annex Mexico. [Read more…] about Homeland (In)security.

New projects…

I have a couple of new projects to talk about. I’m a member of an indoor pistol/handgun range, set up as a non-profit. They had a really bad website, in desperate need of an update. I”m still tweaking the new stuff, but here’s a before-and-after look at the project:

The old site: http://www.lsgc.org

The new site: http://www.letsshootgunclub.com

Part of the challenge is going to be to get the old site (as well as another one on Tripod.com) shut down, as the people that set those sites up are no longer with the club – and apparently there’s some bad blood between folks that’s caused these sites to remain in limbo.

Another project I’ve been working on is the recently-updated site for my church: http://www.allsaintsamarillo.org. I’m using the Slideshow Pro  Flash component to deliver not only a picture gallery, but a front-page “splash scren” style rotating banner thing, that can be updated by way of SlideshowPro’s excellent CMS tool.

I’d be interested to get some feedback on both projects, if you’re so inclined.

Life is just a Bowl (Game) of Cherries…

I like football. Not exactly your garden-variety, Earth-shattering confession. Perhaps I should ellaborate. I enjoy watching football. In my younger days, I used to enjoy playing some sandlot games at parties, largely because as a 6’4″, 200+ lb. guy, I was fast enough to knock a quarterback or two on their lower posterior regions. Never played ball in High School (broken bones being a potential career-ender for musicians) or college (never took it seriously, nor did I go a school that had an NCAA team). Nonetheless, I enjoy watching the game, but you’d hardly call me a fanatic. I follow the Cowboys and UT, and try to keep up with LSU, and that’s about it. Watched the Fiesta Bowl tonight, and was struck by a couple of things…

  • Colt McCoy is a pretty amazing quarterback.
  • It was a trip, watching Jimmy Johnson and Barry Switzer sitting next to each other in the Fox studio, and having to pretend not to loath each other.
  • The second half of the game was really exciting (the first half, not so much).
  • UT deserves to be playing for the National championship.
  • The BCS system is a complete joke. [Read more…] about Life is just a Bowl (Game) of Cherries…

A Tale of Two Satires.

Over the weekend, I rented a slew of movies for me and my family. (It beat contending with the drunks and nutjobs on the road for a meaningless New Year’s celebration. When we rent movies, we get some for my daughter that we can watch as “family fare,” one that I can enjoy as a “guy thing” (in this case, Death Race), and a couple that Mrs. Digital and I can enjoy when our daughter is asleep. I chose a couple that looked promising, War, Inc. with John Cusack, and the Cohen Brothers Burn After Reading. Being a card-carrying conservative, I’m used to having to put up with movies that espouse a liberal/secular/progressive point of view, and movies that hit you over the head with their liberal’s-eye view of the world. I’m resigned to having to filter out the liberal subtexts, and laugh off the obvious, ham-handed attempts to make conservatives look stupid/incompetent/lazy/criminal. It’s not fair. I don’t like it. And I wish they wouldn’t do it. But I’m resigned to it. Having said all that, allow me to compare and contrast these two satirical flicks for your edification. [Read more…] about A Tale of Two Satires.