State of the Union

I’ve been watching some of the State of the Union address tonight, and there was a comment President Bush made and a Democratic reaction that stunned me.

If you’ve ever watched a State of the Union address, then you know that it can seem like an up-and-down clapping fest. When President Bush says something Republicans like, they stand, and the Democrats will stand I think when they feel like they have to. That may be a little cynical of me, but that’s the way it seems.

Which brings me to a comment and reaction. The comment went like this…

For America, this is a nightmare scenario. For the enemy, this is the objective. Chaos is their greatest ally in this struggle. And out of chaos in Iraq, would emerge an emboldened enemy with new safe havens… new recruits … new resources … and an even greater determination to harm America. To allow this to happen would be to ignore the lessons of September 11th and invite tragedy. And ladies and gentlemen, nothing is more important at this moment in our history than for America to succeed in the Middle East … to succeed in Iraq … and to spare the American people from this danger.

Did Nanci Pelosi shoot of her chair like she did after some of the President’s statements. No. Did almost a whole half of the room leave their chairs at all after this comment? No. That’s sad.

You see Democrats in congress say they want to win the war. President Bush just said that winning the war in Iraq is critical to our nation, which was followed by silence on the Left. So, I guess they want to win the war, but only if it is won their way. Why can’t we just win the war? Why the stubborness?

It is critical that we succeed in Iraq. It is critical that Iraq becomes a free and stable country. It is critical that terrorism is halted. Has the President done everything correctly in handling this war? Of course not. Mistakes have been made. War is not easy. We shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that it is. What is important is that we make progress, and end this war as quickly as possible, so that our loved ones can come home, and so that our world is a safer place.

I only hope that we can overcome our political differences and come up with a solution that speeds this process along.

Almost Successful Upgrade

Tonight I upgraded to Wordpress 2.1. The upgrade went smoothly, except for one tiny little part.

I thought I had backed up everything I needed for the transition. When I upgrade my WordPress installation, I follow a pretty simple process, although I wouldn’t recommend it. Always follow the upgrade instructions at the WordPress site.

My upgrade goes something like this.

1.) Delete the old files, except the ones that need to be backed up (any themes, plugins, configuration files, etc., as listed in the official upgrade instructions.

2.) Upload the newly downloaded files along with the old files I had backed up.

Tonight I forget to back up all of my theme files. These files control the look of the blog. To my horror, after my successful upgrade, I saw the default theme on the blog. I started to go into panic mode.

Then along comes Google. I used the Google cache of my blog to find the missing pieces of HTML I needed. I would have been completely lost without this information. It would have taken a few days to get everything the way I wanted it. After getting the missing HTML, I downloaded the old theme I was using (Almost Spring by Rebecca Wei, and with the HTML I found in the cached page, patched the theme back to the way it used to be.

After about 30 minutes or so, the blog was back up and looking the way it was supposed to.

So when you upgrade, be careful, and follow ALL of the instructions. Don’t get bit like I did.

Colts and Bears

Well, Super Bowl XLI is going to be Colts – Bears. Not the matchup I would have liked at the beginning of the season, but it should be interesting nonetheless.

I didn’t catch much of the Bears – Saints game. We were too busy bowling and trading forehand shots on the Wii. However, I did catch almost the entire Colts game. I’m not really a huge Colts fan, but I was rooting for them today, because they were playing the Patriots. I really can’t stand them, for some reason.

It looked like the Patriots were going to go to yet another Super Bowl during the first half. They went into the locker room with a 21-6 advantage. However, the Colts made quick work of chipping away at the lead during the third quarter. The Colts eventually took the lead in the last minute of the game and never looked back.

A couple of firsts/records were made today. This will be the first Super Bowl to feature an African-American head coach (actually, now it will feature two). Also, the Colts made the biggest comeback ever in a conference championship game.

Something that impressed me as a I was starting to write this blog was that the very first thing the Colts owner wanted to do was give glory to God for this victory – very impressive. Once Tony Dungy got his chance to speak, he also gave glory and thanks to God. Something you don’t see very often, except when rappers accept awards for songs containing all sorts of profanity and then thank, “their Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Something never seems quite write with those acceptance speeches.

I’ll definitely be pulling for the Colts in the Super Bowl. Here’s hoping that it’s a good one with some great commercials.

2006 Stats

Several blogs that I read have posted their 2006 statistics over the last couple of weeks. Although mine pale in comparison, I thought I’d share them anyway.

Thanks to the good folks over at Google Analytics, the statistics are as follows.

Total visits: 457

Page Views: 1,937

And to help prove that you never know how people might find your web site, here are some of the search terms visitors used when finding my site.

define condemnation, jared barden blog, define jared, define a person that went crazy, flag+desecration+failed, define sports, bush iran war, anti-santa scripture, define: jared

As you can see, people were searching for all sorts of stuff when they stumbled upon my site. The search engine marketer in me has to point out that blogging can be a great way to bring traffic to a site, especially for a niche site where this is not a lot of online competition. Just a thought.
The other day I read an article that talked about people blogging just for the sake of blogging, not unlike someone speaking solely because they like the sound of their own voice. I hope this is not one of those blogs. I find blogging is a good outlet for my thoughts, views, etc. My mom always encouraged me to keep a journal, so I guess I’m living out that encouragement now.

Do I wish thousands of people read my blog? It would be kind of cool, I’ll admit it. However, if I can make a difference in just one person’s life, it would be more than worth it.

Over the past year I have debated whether or not posting such personal opinions on this blog was a good thing. Was I being too preachy? What if certain people read this blog, etc. etc. I finally came to the decision that it did not matter. I am not ashamed of who I am. Am I a Christian? Yes. Do I have outspoken viewpoints that might not fit in with the norm of society? Yes. That’s who I am. I won’t change that.

I want this to be a place where people are challenged, informed, etc. I want to be able to share my faith, and hopefully make a life-changing impact on someone’s life.

I believe I’m on my way.

Potential Roadblock to Cancer Cure

Apparently some scientists have discovered a potential cure for cancer. However, there may be a roadblock to future funding.

According to this article a, “…molecule known as DCA was shown to shrink lung, breast and brain tumours in both animal and human tissue experiments.”

This sounds like a treatment that could have huge potential. However, the article goes on to state that pharmaceutical companies might be hesitant in offering funds for continued research, because the treatment doesn’t have a patent. Apparently no patent = no profit.

It’s sad to think that there could be a cure, or at least a help, for cancer and that it wouldn’t be pursued due a lack of profitability.

Really, what’s more important – curing a terrible disease for possibly thousands of people or making a buck?

Bloggers Required to Register?

No, I’m not a lawyer, but some news that came across Google Reader yesterday has me concerned.

According to this, a proposed Senate bill would require, “…even bloggers, who communicate to 500 or more member of the public on policy matters, to register and report quarterly to Congress the same as the big K Street lobbyists.”

I don’t know about you, but I don’t like the sound of that one bit. Apparently this bill is seeing support from both sides of the political aisle.

One of the greatest features of America is our freedoms. One of the biggest is the Freedom of Speech. I should be able to say what I want to say, and I shouldn’t have to register with the government if I’m going to be blogging about governmental issues. That seems a little too “Big Brother” for me.

Perhaps this is all being blown out of proportion and we’ll all be proven to be paranoid, but it does sound suspicious.

Of course I don’t have 500 regular readers, so nothing to worry about here!

The Wii Experience

I had been hoping to play the new Nintendo Wii ever since it was released in November. This weekend I finally got my chance, and the Wii did not disappoint.

My friend, Dave, had bought two Wiis when they first came out – one for a friend, and one to sell eventually. He brought the system over on Friday night for us to give it a try, and it was awesome.

Now the Wii will never match the processing power of the XBOX 360 or the Playstation 3, but Nintendo has never tried to market it that way. In fact it seems they have gone out of their way to make sure people know that is not the focus of the console. The focus is most definitely the revolutionary style of gameplay.

Within minutes of hooking the machine up, I was working on my forehand in tennis on Wii Sports (the free collection of games that comes with the Wii). Wii Sports is definitely addicting, and it was definitely a smart move on Nintendo’s part to include such a fun collection of games with the machine. We also spent time bowling, golfing, playing baseball and boxing.

I guess I should point out that with the Wii you actually swing the remote. It has an accelerometer and is motion sensitive. When you bowl, you actually making a bowling motion. When you golf, you do your best Tiger Woods impersonation and hope you hit that little ball straight down the fairway.

Boxing is probably the most vigorous game I’ve played so far. Some people will say that it’s not true to life, and it’s not completely, but you definitely get some exercise throwing jabs and hooks.

The selling point for Danielle was the fact that you can download games for older systems (NES, Super Nintendo, Nintendo 64, Sega Genesis, etc.). Her favorite game of all time – Toe Jam and Earl, was just recently added for download, so we purchased it last night and were playing it late into the night.

More fun Wii stories to come, I’m sure, and hopefully I’ll get some video up here.

Lovely Rita and the iPhone

So, today was the announcement of the long-anticipated iPhone. In the midst of all the hoopla, it seems that some people are missing something pretty significant.

For a little background information, apparently the Beatles started a recording studio or company called Apple Records which then sued Apple Computer a while ago, I believe over the use of the Apple name. Apparently part of the settlement was that Apple Computer would never get in to the music business. Well along came iTunes, the iPod, and the iTunes Music Store, and now you have a problem. Recently Apple Records sued Apple Computer again, but I believe the judge ruled in favor of Apple Computer.

Fast forward to today. Steve Jobs, master of the product demonstration, unveils the iPhone, which looks amazing, but it is out of my price range and only works on Cingular. Interestingly Steve chooses to play “Lovely Rita” from the Beatles album, Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. It seems that nothing Mr. Jobs does happens without massive amounts of planning.

As far as I know, the Beatles catalog isn’t available anywhere (legally) for download. It seems strange that they wouldn’t license it somewhere. They could be making a substantial amount of money out of the deal.

Some frantically went to iTunes in search of the Beatles catalog, but alas, it was not there, and might not be there for some time. This move by Apple Computer (which by the way changed its name to just Apple, Inc. today), seems to be a foreshadowing of Beatles goodness to come through the iTunes Music Store.

Today’s announcement was sort of a bummer for me. I was looking for a new iPod that was widescreen and had a touch screen, and I got that, but in the form of a phone. Don’t get me wrong, the phone looks AMAZING, it just wasn’t what I had hoped for.

Dear Apple, I would like an at least 100GB iPod with a large screen, a touch screen, and maybe even some Bluetooth if you can squeeze it in there. Thanks!

Thanks MySpace

I just got locked out of my MySpace account for 15 minutes, due to, “excessive login failures.”

What’s funny is that my login failed once, and that was because the connection got reset, since I was logging in from a dial-up connection. So, I guess one login failure is excessive.

I was just talking with my friend Dennis the other night about whether or not MySpace has hit its peak. I think it probably has. Don’t get me wrong, I love to use it to keep in touch with people, but it just seems so commercialized. I can’t really blame Rupert Murdoch for trying to monetize the ridiculous amount of traffic that comes to the site, but as I’ve said before, they should put a little programming intelligence behind their ads.

Who will be the next MySpace? It will definitely be interesting to see.

Revenge of the Skunk – Part 2

A few days ago I wrote about our troubles with a certain skunk who had taken up residence under our home. I had no idea that the situation would be rectified so quickly.

First, I should note that God allows us to go through tests in our lives I believe to see how we will handle them. To see if we are ready for bigger tests, responsibilities, etc. Unfortunately, I don’t know how well we handled this test, when I step back and think about it. I think we (I guess I should only speak for myself) could have handled it better. It seemed like such a huge problem, when in reality it could have been much worse.

Danielle and I are very blessed. We are blessed far beyond I could ever imagine. I think we forget that every once in a while. And I believe God uses situations like the one we just went through to remind us not only of how well we have it but of how much He cares about us. We serve a God who is concerned about the intimate details of our life, which is amazingly comforting.

I threw this video together in iMovie to put a light spin on the situation. It really was pretty comical when you think about it, even if it’s hard to grasp the humor of it all.