The Party of Fiscal Responsibility

The GOP has a website. And they got it for a bargain price:

The Republican National Committee shelled out $1.4 million dollars over the last six months for Web sites and services, much of which was spent on GOP.com, the party’s major Web presence that was unveiled this month, new Federal Election Commission expense reports show.

The figure is far higher than what experts estimate it should have cost, and five times the amount its Democratic counterpart spent to host and maintain Democrats.org.

The biggest disparity seems to be bandwidth costs–the RNC paid Smartech Corp., a Republican-focused hosting firm, more than a million dollars, plus $22,000 to Eloqua, compared to the DNC’s $203,000 to Sprint, Switch and Data and Servint Corp.–despite the fact that the two sites’ traffic, which determines bandwidth usage and, largely, hosting costs, was the same.

But the design of the site itself was costly, too. In the months prior to the October 13 launch of GOP.com, the committee paid $328,000 to 11 firms for Web development. (The Democrats, which did not completely overhaul their site during that time period, spent $45,000 on Web development.)

And when the GOP’s graphics-laden product was unveiled, many of the main sections appeared missing or broken, including one advertised as listing future party leaders, which showed up blank.

http://realtime.sunlightprojects.org/2009/10/23/entering-digital-age-an-expensive-proposition-for-gop/

And St. Sleazy McCain wants to regulate the internet? What a great plan!

Seriously, web pages designers are cheap these days. There are about 25 brazillion of them out there. But the GOP finds the most expensive incompetent on the market who fails to create a working page. Just think what would happen if they tried to run the country...oh, wait...we know what happened.

F-16's Overhead

Well, that was interesting. As part of the local universities homecoming celebration, a flight of F-16's did a flyover ahead of the football game.
Which seems rather strange, as the game is being played in a domed stadium.
(BTW: F-16's are really loud. The sound drowned out a train horn.)

Another Pair of Boobies

Friday already? This week slipped right by me.

Birds Don't Understand Baseball

Watching the Baseball playoffs with Griselda, I've come to the conclusion that she really doesn't understand the game. Every time the Yankees scored a run, I'd say "damn", and she would squawk loudly, but that's how she reacts to most things I say. She does watch the ball on the TV screen, but it's the same way she watches anything that moves on the screen. I doubt that she grasps how truly evil the Yankees are.

(dang, is this really the first thing I've posted since Monday? I'm slacking as a blogger.)

Another Step Toward Sanity

Sometimes small issues show clearly how much better Obama is for the country than shrub ever was. For example, law enforcement:

The Obama administration will not seek to arrest medical marijuana users and suppliers as long as they conform to state laws, under new policy guidelines to be sent to federal prosecutors Monday.

Two Justice Department officials described the new policy to The Associated Press, saying prosecutors will be told it is not a good use of their time to arrest people who use or provide medical marijuana in strict compliance with state laws.

The new policy is a significant departure from the Bush administration, which insisted it would continue to enforce federal anti-pot laws regardless of state codes.

Fourteen states allow some use of marijuana for medical purposes: Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington.

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/2009/10/19/2009-10-19_obama_administration_medical_marijuana_users_suppliers_wont_be_prosecuted_as_lon.html

Yeah, it's a very small step, but by accepting medical marijuana in states that have legalized it Obama has ended a hateful and inhumane position of the shrub administration, and a total waste of government resources. I'm one of those liberals who would like to see all marijuana legalized, as a matter of personal freedom, but medical marijuana shouldn't even be debatable for humanitarian reasons.

So, one good (albeit small) step.

The Owl I Saw

Appears to be a Saw-Whet Owl.
The story: Late on the second night of the trip, I awoke with a need to urinate (the predictable result of drinking beer by the campfire prior to crawling into my sleeping bag). I opened my tent flap, and this little guy was sitting on a branch about ten feet away (those are my river pants drying out in the branch to the left). Luckily, I was able to reach my camera and snap a couple of pics before he/she flew away, even though I was too 'pressured' to get a good focus. 'Twas a unique incident on the trip.


(click for larger view)

Back in Civilization

I'm back. Nine days away from civilization can be quite refreshing, but nine days on the river is even beyond that. I am rather tired, however. I'll try to post more pics and stories soon.
Damn, what are all those people doing out there?