I'm starting to wonder where the Democrats are. In the last few weeks I've heard barely anything from the party, when I would think that this is a time when they would be out in force. Could it be that yet again the Democrats are going to completely drop the ball. Right now, as we speak, the following things have happened in national politics.

• Bush appointed a complete idiot to be the head of FEMA. New Orleans was flooded by a hurricane. Major idiot does nothing.
• The House Majority Leader is under inditement from a Texas grand jury.
• Gas costs are so high that filling my Volkswagen is painful.
• Karl Rove, the President's senior and most trusted advisor, leaked the identity of a CIA operative as political payback.
• We are engaged in a massive urban war, between factions with centuries of hatred between them, in a land riddled with insecurity and violence. A war that was brought to be thru a massive web of lies and propaganda.
• The FBI is taking time out from hunting terrorists to download porn.
• The Senate majority leader is under investigation by the Ethics commit on charges of insider trading.
• Massive deficits with no sign of tax increases or spending cuts.

In other words, it's a mess. But still, this doesn't seem to enough for the Democrats to run with. Are they actually so inept that they can't bring to light massive problems incompetency and ethics in the Republican party? Are they literally going to have to burn down the White House during a kegger before someone notices?

I know that for long term success the Democrats need to put forth a moral vision for the country. In the meantime though, can we at least keep the Republicans playing defense? If they're trying hard to prove they aren't crooks and morons, then they won't have time to any more damage.

I'm starting to truly wonder how I didn't do well at college in the past. It isn't that hard. You show up, you do the work, you answer some questions. Right now, the hardest problem I'm having is with boredom. I'm taking 4 classes, 3 of which are dull enough to drive one to tears. I'm not sure how many more hours of listening to the pluses and minuses of federalism I can take. It's like watching CSPAN, but you can't get up for a soda and a copy of the New York Times.

I exaggerate of course, but I haven't felt challenged in any of my classes yet. In my Quiz in logic today, I didn't realize that one of the variables was the same on each side of the equation until I was halfway thru the problem. I had to go back to redo it. That was the closest I've come to challenging yet.

I really like my CS class, and I dislike it at the same time. I like the professor, I've enjoyed learning Java, and I love the times when we can get into a good argument about a bit of code. I dislike that I'm paying around $700 to learn nothing I didn't already know. In lab I spend most of my time teaching the TA various programming concepts. Last week it was closures. Seriously.

Don't get me wrong, the TA is a real smart guy, I just have the feeling that he hasn't been exposed to some of the more interesting things going in computer science at the moment. He enjoys are chats so much that he wants me to give a talk to the CS club. I absolutely want to do that - I've even started putting some slides together - but I don't when I'll be able to. The CS class meets during my lecture on federalism.

My place in school is an odd one. I'm older than almost everyone in my classes, but not by all that much. I'm young enough to pass as the same age, but only in looks. I think it gives me a bit of perspective on things. More than anything, it's reminded me of one thing: everyone else is just as insecure as I am. It's a wonderful feeling, like sliding into a warm bed after a long, cold day.

Structure had been missing from my life for the last year, and until it returned I did not know how much I missed it, or needed it. In just having a place I have to be every day, I find myself more energized, alive, and awake. My mind seems to be running at full power for the first time in years. I feel young again, my mind a sponge ready to absorb all the ideas around me. I've been reading at a scary pace: something like 4 books a week. I've started learning haskell, so I can hack on pugs. I've taken an interest in aspect oriented programming.

Saturday, we get together to see Serenity. I haven't been this excited about a movie since Return of The King. A whole bunch of my friends are meeting up in Lansing to see it in a THX theater. I got the Family Guy DVD in today. It isn't bad. It's not mind blowing or anything, just 2 hours of good Family Guy.

Wanted: One or more person(s) to join me on a day trip to Cedar Point.

When: October 8th, 22nd or 29th. Morning till late. (Park is open from noon till midnight.)

Money: Isn't a deal breaker. Pay for what you can.

Rides: I like to ride the big coasters. If you don't like those, then this trip isn't for you.

GOAL!

God I missed that.

I swear to god, yesterday in my lit class after a debate over the Patriot Act this guy turns to me and says, "There's this movie you gotta see, called 1984."

Yeah.

I'm into my second full week of school now, and I'm starting to gain some perspective on things.

Good

Parking in eastern. Back at MSU, parking was something like Cheney's soul; rumored to exist but difficult to find. Parking at MSU is more like parking in the same state as MSU and hoping that you survive the walk to campus. The commuter lot is literally miles from campus. At Eastern there is ample parking on campus.

Bad

No campus preacher. I suppose Eastern isn't big enough to get one full time, but I wish we had a campus preacher. He would yell at the students holding hands, rant about Revelations, and generally doom all who walked near. It just doesn't seem like school without him around.

Bad

I think I may be smarter than two of my professors. I'm not going to name names, as I would still like to get good grades, but I am not completely comfortable with the idea.

Horrific

The "chinese" place in the union. I miss the Panda Express I used to go to at MSU. My old job there was across the river from the international center, and we used to walk there for lunch. I loved that panda express.

Good

I seem to have been drafted into the Computer Science club at eastern. I was discussing some perl 6 concepts with our grad assistant, mostly roles and junctions. I was then told that I was going to give a talk. I've been drafted. Maybe I'll give a talk on Class::DBI and getting the job down with time left for drinking. Gotta spread the word.

Horrific

In certain parts of the library there is a loud low frequency harmonic rumble. It must be at least down at 25hz, and I would guess around 75dB. Not the sort of thing that one would expect in a library.

Good

The book we're reading in lit, Paul Auster's CIty of Glass, is sublime. This is by far the best novel I've ever had to read for a class. I started it today, and chewed thru the first 80 pages in no time. Damn good stuff. Though, I would like Paul to stop writing about himself. Yes, one must write what they know, but I'm starting to wonder if he ever gets out, or watches the Discovery Channel.

I've finished my first project for my CS class. Typical annoying CS busy work, but it did give me a chance to play with Java. As I've said earlier, I do like Java, but it has some annoyances:

1. No function pointers. A callback here or there would be nice.
2. No lexical scopes. This can be very handy, and...
3. No closures. No lexical scopes + no pointers = no closures. Closures are incredibly useful and powerful. Yes, I know I can fake it with anonymous classes. No, that's not good enough.
4. After 40 years of language development, it's shocking that we're still using languages with fixed arrays. We're using compilers for a reason!
5. Constructors can't be inherited. Sometimes inheritance isn't about changing instance variables!
6. Static. Don't use the keyword static in your language. It means 8 different things in dozens of different languages. Use a name that actually has a mnemonic.
7. Instance/method access. This is actually a mistake that java inherited from C++. The paradigm of directly accessing methods and instance variables inside a class is bad. It's too easy to confuse them with a static member. Java has plenty of spare syntax to make it easy:

   public void foo() {
       return foo;      // Instance or static var?
   }
   
   public void bar() {
       return this.bar; // clear, but bad Huffman coding!
   }
   
   public void bar() {
       return :baz;     // nice and perl6'ish!
   }

8. No operator overloading. I know some people don't like this, but I do. We could avoid all sorts of object.equals(thingy) shenanigans and save on typing. object == thingy please.
9. The compiler error messages suck. We'll, more to the point the tools we've been told to use suck. I have a very nice editor, I would like to use it.
10. Exceptions: good. Declaring what exceptions a method might throw: handy. Having to do that all over the place just to use a damn exception: crap.

I said a few times in public that I thought Nintendo might be trouble with the revolution.

I was wrong.

I still plan to get a PS3, but I'm now giving some real thought to getting a Revolution. That controller looks damn good. That controller looks nano good. The idea sounds excellent. Long overdue too - there hasn't been a substantive change in controller design since the Nintendo 64 controller. I wonder if the PS4 controller will have tilt sensors. Probably, as Sony doesn't actually have ideas of their own.

This looks pretty damn cool. Imagine a lightsaber game with that controller. You could be all Obi-Wan on someone's ass. Like the nano, it's a bit of technology that has my hand reaching for my credit card before my brain knows what's happening. Combine that controller with game cube compatibility (which means Zelda!), and I think Nintendo might catch up with Sony and Microsoft. I would have never said that a day ago.

Besides, Sony is pissing me off. I had completely beaten Lego Star Wars, only to have my saved game get corrupted. Not actually Sony's fault, but I've chosen to lay the blame on them. The widescreen setting of the PS2 is odd too. It is wide, but not fully out to anamorphic 480i. You end up with a black border completely around the game. I would have suspected my television, but my TV has been calibrated.

Now if only we can get the thing pushing 1080i.

I'm starting to become concerned that I'm in the wrong CS class. I already know everything in the class. Now, when I say that, I don't just mean that I already took a class in it or read a book. No, I mean that I've been using these concepts in the real world for years. I talked to my professor a bit about my concern. He agreed with me that I was going to have to focus to stay with the class, and that there isn't really anything I can do skip ahead.

Today we spent 2 hours on inheritance. That was bad. Near the end I was looking for a solid surface to beat my head against. We're not done with inheritance either, we still have a lab on monday and a project after that. The one saving grace is Java. Years ago, Martin told me that I would like Java. He was right. It's very clean, with good tools and a good object model. I wish there were function references, and operator overloading, but all and all I've worked with worse languages.

My other classes aren't as dull - I don't already know the material in those classes. I'm starting to get a good read on the best way to drive out there. It's going ok.

Somewhere, close by, lives an asshole. I was playing my electric drumset, a drumset that makes almost no noise. I hear a sound thru the headphones. I hear it again. Someone is trying to talk thru my window. I can't see them. They want me to stop drumming.

Now, I did, because as much as I am a total jerk, I still try to be civil.

I have doubts though. I doubt anyone behind my house could hear that, which is where you'd have to be to hear it at all. I know it isn't really that loud at all. I'm pretty sure this person, is in fact, an asshole. He would have to be listening fairly closely. I wonder what else he's heard. Television, movies, music, sex. Maybe he owns a parabolic microphone. Maybe he's a stalker. Lord knows you have to be careful these days.

There's an asshole about.

So I'm trying out a new keyboard, a Kensington SlimType. I really like the feel, it's just like a powerbook's keyboard and I can type quiet quickly with it. I'm not as sure of the layout. The command keys are too small, and the arrow keys are dropped down. I'm wondering if I should have gotten a Macally icekey instead. It looks like it has the same type of keys with a standard extended layout. The Macally is a little pricy though. I think I will wait to see if I get used to this keyboard and if I don't I'll try the Macally.

I'm sitting in Eastern's library after finishing my first class of the day. I've had classes in the past that bordered on the pointless, but this might have been a new one. He read the syllabus. He seemed like a neat guy; a Jamaican almost done with his Ph. D in Political Science. His accent gave his voice a playful lift that wouldn't be out of place on NPR or the BBC. In introducing the subject to the class, he made it clear that everyone's politcal opinions were valid and respected. One could tell that close to the surface he had opinions on the state of America that ran deep however.

So syllabus day continues. I used to like the first week of college. There are few responsibilities, and even fewer reasons to be in class. I'm here though, because this time around I'm paying for these classes. I would rather not have a whole class day devoted to reading 3 pages outloud. I just don't feel like I'm getting my money's worth.

One striking difference from the last time I was in school is the number of cell phones you see. When I was at MSU you would see a student with a cell phone a few times a day. Perhaps one in thirty carried a cell phone on campus. Not anymore. I would guess that around one in thirty didn't have a cell phone. It's standard issue these days, and instead of talking to the person next to you in the real world we talk to a little box in our hand. Why is it that we become more distant as we become more connected?

Up on the north side of campus is the park. It isn't really a park, just some woods and a big pond with a couple fountains. The water in the pond is a shade of blue that does not exist in nature, a cross between cobalt and jade. I was sitting by the pond reading my chapter for American Government when I realized that I had never really left school. In a way, I'm still sitting in daka talking to Prof. Barnett about the joy of learning and the basic greatness of intellectual curiosity. I should have never left WPI, but at the same time I would not trade the last 4 years for anything in the world. We come full circle in life more often than not, and everytime around we're supposed to learn something.

The iPod nano is sick. Fucking sick. Diseased. If it were a woman I would long for it from afar, writing french couplets in an 18th century courtship sort of way. Sick.

The iTunes phone is useless and lame. I knew it was going to be useless before hand, but I was hopeful that it would have Apple's zen-like industrial design. It doesn't though, it's just an ugly Motorola phone that can play 100 songs. Dumb.

I'm with Jon, Marvel is not thinking. They basically have on good character left, Captain America. Captain America is no Spiderman, and he has nothing on the X-Men. Marvel has had 4 good (and successful) movies in recent history: X-Men, Spiderman, X2, and Spiderman 2. The rest, Daredevil, Hulk, The Punisher, Elektra, Man-Thing and Fantastic Four were all flops. 3 out of 4 Marvel franchises failed as a movie and these were the most well known and adaptable franchises.

I think they're going to fail. If they do, I'm going to point and laugh.

Editors Note: Kyle and I have discussed this post some, and I've come to the conclusion that it doesn't seem to be tongue-in-cheek when it is supposed to be. This is all supposed to be in jest. Sarcasm and all that.

Later today, I will be a college student once again. I see this endeavor as having two fronts. First, I will be going to class, doing working and finishing my degree. Second, I will be a cultural anthropologist hiding in the dusty shrub just outside the village, observing the natives.

I have gone to campus a few times to get things set up and every time I quickly become a stranger in a strange land. I'm just not 18 anymore. This semester I will be taking classes with 18 year olds though, and maybe - just maybe, I can pass as one of them. I'll listen to bad music, and eat horribly, and brag about getting ahold of some beer. I'll befriend a wide-eyed freshman, and then tell him that I can't hang out on Saturday - I'm going to Aspen for the weekend. Just when he thinks that he has me figured out, I'll start bitching about property taxes and the cost of building a wine cellar.

Most of my classes should be pretty fun, the biggest challenge will probably be my computer science class. This class covers topics I mastered long ago. Keeping focused thru the semester is going to be hard. Yes, I understand polymorphic equivalence. No, multiple inheritance isn't a great idea (most of the time). When's lunch? I'm going to go play around with lambda calculus in PPC assembly.

I'm looking forward to my Philosophy class in symbolic logic. I'm great at things like that, and the instructor looks interesting. Anyone that noticed that Andrea Dworkin died is ok in my book. For my lit class, one of the books is by Paul Auster, nothing wrong with that. My last glass is in American Government. I've seen the West Wing. I think I'll be ok.

So, nothing taxing to start with, but a good selection for getting back into the flow of school. I'm still trying to find the best route for the commute (which may end up being the worst part of school). Books are purchased and I've got my schedule imported into iCal - synced with my phone and iPod. I'm ready.

My family had a little get together this weekend. There were Aunts and Uncles, BBQ chicken, and potato salad. We drank wine and beer, and my cousin Hugh drove his remote control car into the pool - there were no survivors. My grandmother made key lime fingers, which while not very tasty where an excellent water repellent.

After the extended family had left Lynne and Linda, family friends, remained. Not longer after that, the conversation turned to hurricanes, wars, and idiots. I'm not completely sure if any real conclusions were reached, but I did pick up a few things: even with the huge tragedy in wake of Katrina there are deeper problems in this country that will remain long after New Orleans is back on its feet.

It boils down to the three dirty little secrets of Katrina: poverty, cronyism, and Iraq.

New Orleans is one of the poorest city in the US. 27.9% of New Orleans lives in poverty, almost 1 in 3. While some of these people are poor due to their own hand, most are poor for reasons outside of their control. They are part of the millions in this country struggling under the yoke of structural poverty. This is not something that white suburbia likes to think about, let alone talk about during an election year. They are now refugees not because they didn't want to live town, but because they couldn't. They had no cars, no access to public transportation, and the evacuation plan for New Orleans did not account for them. They were told to go to the Superdome, and there wasn't even a plan for the next day at the Superdome.

Which leads us to cronyism. Mike Brown was the college roommate of Joe Allbaugh. Joe was the prior head of FEMA, and Bush's chief of staff during Bush's tenure as Governor of Texas. The rumor is that Joe helped clean up Bush's National Guard record, but that's just a rumor. What we do know is that Joe cut millions in disaster mitigation from FEMA's budget. As recently as this summer, FEMA denied Louisiana communities' pre-disaster mitigation funding requests.

Then Joe appointed Mike Brown as FEMA's Deputy Director and General Consul. Mike had just left, I swear to god, a gig as the Judges and Stewards Commissioner of the Arabian Horse Association. I've spent some time with the show horse crowd. They are in their own little bubble world; crazed and ungrounded. Mike was seen to be a little to crazy for that group. He had become known as the "czar", for his zeal and breath of power in rules enforcement. He was the Darth Vader of the Arabian show horse circuit.

He eventually had to leave because there were over 17 complaints regarding his office, and a number of lawsuits. A legal defense fund had to be created because legal fees had put the IAHA $900,000 in debt. I wonder how many people can be bussed out of New Orleans for nine hundred large. Meanwhile his legal fees drove the IAHA into the ground, and they had to merge with the AHA.

During his time running FEMA, $30 million was sent to Miami for disaster relief after Hurricane Frances. Frances did not affect Miami. Some of the inspectors sent to south Florida had records such as embezzlement, drug dealing and robbery.

Sounds like the perfect guy to run disaster management.

The final leg of this triangle of shame leads us to the National Guard. No, there's nothing shameful about the guard. They're doing incredible work far outside what they originally signed up for under unbelievable conditions... in Iraq. The administration keeps saying that they have more than enough National Guard to handle the situation in Louisiana and Mississippi. Bullshit. 40% of the national guard is in Iraq. I know that the Bush administration likes to ignore reality when it isn't favorable, but at some point you have to deign to the truth.

I'm not going to talk about how the Bush administration likes to ignore the poor and non-caucasian. That's left as an exercise for the reader.

Read this. Read it right now.

This guy is a strait up idiot:

http://onegoodmove.org/1gm/1gmarchive/002339.html#002339

It's so strange to see real journalism.

This was not covered by CNN, ABC or NBC:

'Five shot dead' in New Orleans