Here’s what BP has in store for the Arctic: First, the company will drill two miles beneath its tiny island, which it has christened “Liberty.” Then, in an ingenious twist, it will drill sideways for another six to eight miles, until it reaches an offshore reservoir estimated to hold 105 million barrels of oil. This would be the longest “extended reach” well ever attempted, and the effort has required BP to push drilling technology beyond its proven limits. As the most powerful “land-based” oil rig ever built, Liberty requires special pipe to withstand the 105,000 foot-pounds of torque — the equivalent of 50 Mack truck engines — needed to turn the drill. “This is about as sexy as it gets,” a top BP official boasted to reporters in 2008. BP, a repeat felon subject to record fines for its willful safety violations, calls the project “one of its biggest challenges to date” — an engineering task made even more dangerous by plans to operate year-round in what the company itself admits is “some of the harshest weather on Earth.”

via Rolling Stone Politics – BP’s Next Disaster. The next place for BP to start drilling, the Arctic.

It is a connection that those who support stronger enforcement of immigration laws and tighter borders often make: rising crime at the border necessitates tougher enforcement.

But the rate of violent crime at the border, and indeed across Arizona, has been declining, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, as has illegal immigration, according to the Border Patrol. While thousands have been killed in Mexico’s drug wars, raising anxiety that the violence will spread to the United States, F.B.I. statistics show that Arizona is relatively safe.

via NYTimes.com – On Border Violence, Truth Pales Compared to Ideas. Once again perception and idealougy trumps facts.

What may be the most controversial part of the declassified plan is a discussion of a need for the government to define its role in protecting private critical infrastructure networks. Critical infrastructure includes the electrical grid, telecommunication networks, internet service providers, the banking and financial industry, and others.

via U.S. Declassifies Part of Secret Cybersecurity Plan | Threat Level | Wired.com. Is it necessary for the government to protect the civilian  infrastructure, probably though the details will be the sticking point.

In the newsletter Rep. Neugebaur talks about Pres. Obama’s recent decision to reverse a Pres. GW Bush era policy of restricting government funding on any new human embryonic stem cell lines created after Aug. 9th 2001. Quoting from the newsletter (emphasis mine):

Today, President Obama reversed the Bush Administration’s policy of banning federal funds from going to research that involves the destruction of human embryos.

I am disappointed in President Obama’s executive order. I strongly believe the rights of the unborn need to be protected from the point of conception, which is why I cannot support the use of tax dollars to fund research that millions of Americans, including myself, believe destroys human life.

The major advances in stem cell research have come from adult stem cells, not embryonic ones.  Several findings have recently been made that show stem cells found in umbilical cord blood, amniotic fluid, and bone marrow tissue have the same flexibility as embryonic stem cells.  Research using adult stem cells is being used to treat diseases, and taxpayer research dollars should go toward advances that are producing results.

Let’s discuss some of Rep. Neugebauer’s points, most importantly the “believe destroys human life”. Not that it does destroy human life, because well there is no evidence of such, just people’s belief that it does. There is no evidence of any such destruction of human life in those blog posts, articles or links presented by Google, in fact most of them talk about just the opposite, about how scientific research is making it less and less necessary for stem cells to be grown in the labs from human embryo’s.

Update: I made a mistake, but it actually works out favorably. According to Scientist and Engineers for America: “The Executive Order does not affect the prohibition on using federal funding for creating destroying, or discarding human embryos. This prohibition first became law in 1996 and is known as the Dickey-Wicker amendment. Subsequent laws appropriating money for the Department of Health and Human Services all carry this prohibition (shown here in H.$. 3043, the 2008 appropriations for HHS). After today, federal dollars can go toward research on hundreds of cell lines in existence, but not to creating new lines.” So Rep. Neugebauer can’t even claim that federal dollars are going towards destroying human embryos. Sorry about the mistake.

Which might make you ask, so what’s the big deal about the executive order then if it really isn’t needed? Two points here, first of all that science has yet to find a fully reliable source for stem cells as embryos grown in the lab. Second to quote PZ Myers: “You don’t get to hobble the horse and then complain that it hasn’t won any races!” So first of all to fully find a reliable source of stem cells that doesn’t involve growing embryos scientist need to study actual embryonic stem cells (embryonic stem cells have the unique characteristic of being the most adaptable and thus the best avenue for areas of stem cell research). Also Rep. Neugebauer wants to say that the research hasn’t presented anything of any value while at the same saying that science should somehow magically produce results with the main source of science funding cut off. Okay I have a business and decide to cut off 90% of their funding, let’s see the company produce something wonderful, sure.

My final point along this topic is that Rep. Neugebauer or more likely one of his staffers hasn’t linked to a single news article or scientific paper in any of his newsletters describing his actions or providng a more thought out reasoning for why he thinks the way he does. Though what’s to be expected when Obama is the first president “to speak about data in his inaugural address, and only the second to mention statistics.”

That to me is the absolute saddest state in American politics that our presidents aren’t more willing to use data and statistics to back up why they make decisions that they do.

My hope is that we can change this chart around at some point.

Chart Belief in Outrageous Statements

Apple’s first genuine hit was the Macintosh with a graphic user interface that made it easy for everybody to understand how to interact with a computer and see what was going on. What sparked Ebay’s first real success ease of access, selling was quick and painless. If you didn’t sell well who cared it was junk anyways. YouTube lowered the bar towards sharing videos online, Flickr photos, Google searching, Obama to donate and get involved, the list goes on and on. Why is MasterCard adding the ability to pay with out even pulling out your card, ease of access towards that card. The easier it is to use your MasterCard the more likely you are to use it.

As a business you should not create artificial barriers towards letting your users interact with your business/product. This means provide lots of free samples, make it easy to get in touch with you, make your web site easy to navigate and fun to use.

If you are a software company make you applications easy for your customers to get their hands on and use. Interfaces should be clean and easy to grasp. Limit preferences, most of the time the defaults are just fine, the more settings you have the more chances you have to confuse your customers. If a customer can’t grasp an interface the user doesn’t need to be educated the interface needs to change.

I don’t know if the bar can ever be low enough or if it ever is too low, but the lower you make the bar the more likely you are to attract people to your product (be it software, hardware, food, information, skill, or even yourself) means that many more potential customers.

Thanks to Matt Cutts for the inspiration of this post based on his review of the Google Voice Search iPhone App. Specifically “The easier/faster it is to search, the more I searched.”

The Republican Party of the United States over the past several years has bothered me, more and more.

The party has in the past years undergone a change that I believe will not cause the party to gain more unity, but rather cause more people to split from the party. The party has been pretty consistent in only area, everywhere else it says and does two very different things. The party also seems to be promoting the idea that logic and intelligence are flawed qualities in a politician. Wikipedia (as normal in this day and age) has more sources and more information than I could hope to convey regarding this so go look there for more details.

My largest problem with the party has been a promotion of people who genuinely appear to know nothing about how proximity doesn’t equal experience, economics, international affairs, or it seems just about anything other than religion or lipstick. I am genuinely bothered when opponents paint Obama as an elitist to win an election. I want an elitist President, I want a President so ridiculously smart and intelligent I can’t even hope to follow him/her. I want a President who believes in science, a President who is curious beyond anyone else I know, a President who sees the world as the complex system it really is, I want a Renaissance President. And yes I do want a President that actually causes excitement amongst both this nation and other nations. Let’s face it we can’t do everything on our own, we do not rule the world, not by far. Especially in the face of our declining economic strength and political power in the world (awesome book on this subject).

Most of all, I want a President who expresses a belief and actually applies it fully. This is one of the largest reasons why I can’t vote for a Republican the majority of the time. As I stated at the beginning of this post, I do believe in some of the views that the Republican party expresses, but they don’t apply those views.

• Limited Government: Homeland Security was the largest increase in the federal government since the Dept. of Defense and WWII
• No Government intervention between you and your doctor: See Abortion
• Congress should have time to review bills and needs oversight over the President: The Patriot Act was approved by the House of Rep. hours after being revised in the middle of the night
• Less Federal Control, more State Control: DOJ under Bush pushes for Federal Government to have final say on drugs or environment.
• Proclaiming that their candidates have executive experience and can run a business: HP former exec. Carly Fiorina said neither McCain nor Palin could have run HP.
• Education: Uhh the entire point of this post
• Appointing Judges who don’t interpret the Constitution: You know except when they want the Constitution to fit their ideas
• Party of Pro-life: Except when it comes to you know the mother (I dated a girl who if she became pregnant will most likely die, so not only will she not be able to get an abortion but she can’t learn about ways to not get pregnant, so just never have sex is what I guess she is supposed to do.)
• Limited Spending by the Government: Have you looked at our deficit?
• Freedom of Speech: You know except when people might disagree with you.
• How about just simply raising the level of discourse of the election: I took a look at the RNC.org Homepage and observed 8 different promoted items on the main flash window (4 Attack, 1 pro-McCain, 1 Donate, and 2 to Organize). When you only have one ad to promote your platform – that doesn’t raise the discourse level in this country. For comparison the DNC has 4 main ads (1 attack, 2 pro-Obama, 1 Fact Check both anti-McCain and pro-Obama).

What is going on with a party that as far as I can tell says one thing and does another except when it comes to religion? The only thing that the party seems to actually say and do regards social conservative positions.

This party needs to find itself and figure out what it really believes or work out some new form of logic to explain the disconnect between what they say and do.

Most of all a party that believes in the idea that one religion is somehow righter than everybody else and that the rest of the country should fall into line with a religious belief. Let’s get one thing right – Social Conservatives ultimately believe in their views not because it makes sense or they have the evidence to back it up, but because their religion says this is the way things should be. Their religion doesn’t and shouldn’t dictate my life. It’s freedom of religion – not freedom to have religion pushed on you. How does homosexuals being allowed to marry harm their marriage? I also didn’t realize I needed to be reminded to pray in school.

If I was a member of the RNC I would be embarrassed by Sarah Palin just as any Democrat should have been embarrassed by Kerry in 2004. We shouldn’t be embarrassed by our candidates, we should be proud of them.

Intelligence and logic should be first qualifications for a candidate something the Republican Party seems to ignore as far as I can tell, though I would love to hear otherwise.

The Democratic Party strongly and unequivocally supports Roe v. Wade and a woman’s right to choose a safe and legal abortion, regardless of ability to pay, and we oppose any and all efforts to weaken or undermine that right.

I wonder why the Democratic leadership removed the word “rare” in their platform for this upcoming election. First is that Obama has been a pretty strong supporter of comprehensive sex-ed as well as supporting contracteptives. Second it seems that having the word rare in there adds to a wider range of appeal. I would argue there are very few supporters of abortion who want abortion to be a non-rare event. Instead the majority of pro-choice postions support compresenhive sex-ed and cheap and open access to contraceptives to reduce abortion. Why not, the fewer abortions the less of a controversial issue it becomes. Get smart people and increased contracaptives mean fewer abortions which works for both parties.

So I must ask the Democratic Party why the change in language, it seems you are both going against what makes good political and logical sense? Or is there a secondary reason that I am not seeing?

The ad compares Obama to Paris Hilton (I learned writing this post, that Paris Hilton has a website.) and Britney Spears and asks that just because someone has a lot of enthusiastic followers doesn’t make him ready to lead. This ad just doesn’t make sense to me. Wouldn’t you want a politician whom people are enthusiastic over, don’t we want to be excited over our political leaders?

Now the awesome thing is the response Paris Hilton did.

So many political ads seem to simply be put out without any real thought behind them. I really wish the discourse level of politics in America would be raised. The sad thing is that I see The Daily Show and Colbert Report as helping to raise the discourse level

This is a rather controversial topic in America and one that I am admittedly hesitant to write about. For several reasons, first off politics is a highly emotional and personal topic, this causes people to feel very intensely about their particular point of view and ignore other points of view. This is easily seen by both the parties here in America which will routinely criticize one party for doing something that they themselves did just a few years earlier. Also you can see it in the screaming heads we have on cable tv that are more interested in yelling at one another rather than working through an issue. The second reason is that my opinion on this matter is itself rather controversial but obviously I feel a valid opinion.

So should Americans criticize not just a particular opinion, political party or should they also criticize America as a whole? Personally I feel yes for several reasons. America as a whole is both a society, a culture, and a the government as a whole. There are times when the society, the culture and the government as a whole all agree on something that people may feel is wrong. Who then is left to criticize other than America as a whole? A lot of well meaning Americans consider it unpatriotic to criticize the country. There reasoning behind it is that no matter what it still is your country and to criticize America then why are you here in the first place? Which in all honesty isn’t a bad reason, but I think it becomes faulty logic. One doesn’t have to agree with everything that occurs in a country. Part of our citizenship isn’t a requirement that you pledge to never criticize America. Citizenship says that you pledge to follow the rules our society has put into place and to quote Wikipedia:

Responsibilities of citizens

Citizens have the duty to serve in a jury, if selected. Citizens are also required to pay taxes on their total income from all sources worldwide, including income earned abroad while residing abroad (regardless of the duration of the residence) – but only beyond the first $85,700 in this case because of the foreign earned income exclusion.[1] U.S. taxes payable may be further reduced by credits for foreign income taxes. The United States Government also insists that U.S. citizens travel into and out of the United States on a U.S. passport, regardless of any other nationality they may possess.

Male U.S. citizens (including those living permanently abroad and/or with dual U.S./other citizenship) are required to register with the Selective Service System at age 18 for possible conscription into the armed forces. Although no one has been drafted in the U.S. since 1973, draft registration continues for possible reinstatement on some future date.

Citizenship does not mean that you give up an ability to criticize another citizen of America, a political party, or even America as a whole. One of the many freedoms this country gives us is the freedom to criticize America as a whole, the society, the culture, the whole government. There are times when this is appropriate. That isn’t to say that this is something that I feel one should do, day in, day out. But there are times when even I have felt that our society as a whole is participating in something that goes against our foundation, our Consution or even just plain logic. Criticism of something isn’t my way of saying we should throw out whatever I am criticizing or that it shouldn’t exist. It’s my way of saying that such and such is a wrong action. The reason people criticize something is to correct a wrong or perceived wrong action. If America as a whole is undertaking what I perceive to be a wrong action, that isn’t it my place to criticize the action and criticize the country for going along with the decision.

I personally don’t agree Rev. Wright, for several reasons, I don’t think it is the society as a whole that needs to be criticized also I feel that what he is doing isn’t criticism so much as it is trying to stir up emotions around his topic of race relations in America. I feel that debates should be less emotional and more logical that simply saying “God damn” x. That’s not a debate, however to quote Voltaire “I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death, your right to say it.” I will always defend someones right to freedom of speech, even when they disagree with me or even when what they say is controversial.