What's Wrong With This Picture?

A recent poll by Public Agenda finds that the more often Americans go to church, the more supportive they are of the war in Iraq. It found that frequent church-goers are far more likely to support the "War on Terror" and believe the U.S. is accomplishing its goals in Iraq.

The poll found that people who never attend church are much more likely to believe the war is damaging the country's international relations and that the war is costing too much money and too many lives.

This seems backward to me. I'd presume the poll is skewed that way because of the large number of fundamentalist Christians within the U.S. church-going population. I thought Jesus was the Prince of Peace. As Ben Mack has said "Who would Jesus bomb? Nobody. I don't remember him killing anybody in The Bible". Or did Howard Campbell say that? Doesn't really matter. The point is made.

I posit that the more you think for yourself, the more likely you are to believe the war has been/is an ongoing disaster. It follows from the poll results that generally, organized religions (among many other organizations) don't encourage people to think for themselves. They're much easier to control that way.

The Slow Decline of Microsoft?

Or is that wishful thinking? ;-)

Microsoft's next OS "Vista" (known as Longhorn until a couple of weeks ago) has been delayed and delayed and has had previously announced features removed as the delays have piled up. Currently it's scheduled for release in the second half of 2006. Many industry pundits think that may be optimistic. They released a public "developer" beta and Wired News obtained a copy to put through its paces and review.

The review is not very encouraging for Microsoft. They cite attractive graphics (the screenshot in eWeek looks like an homage to Apple's Mac OS X with lots of transparency and drop shadows) and new search-engine functions, but they say there's not much else there to compel upgrading. Additionally, the system requirements are fairly demanding and the beta ran slowly on their setup (an Athlon 2800 with 1GB of RAM). They allowed that speed improvements will probably be a priority for beta 2.

From what I've seen in the IT trade mags I read, MS has yet to generate much enthusiasm for their "next-generation" operating system. Microsoft has made a lot of noise about being allowed to "innovate" since their anti-trust trial. I think they believe their own propaganda, that they really are an "innovative" company, but their current offerings and upcoming offerings seem to lack any real innovation.

Truth in Advertising Disclaimer: I am a Mac user. I'm very familiar with Windows and generally detest it. While I think I'm not one of those Mac fanatics who thinks Apple does no wrong and no one else does any right, generally, I'm drinking Apple's Kool-Aid. The Mac experience blows away anything on the Windows side, I think Microsoft has proven itself to be an extrememly unethical corporation, and I'm not geeky enough to go the Linux route.

29

There have been 29 U.S. military deaths in Iraq in so far this month. Today is the 5th.

Since July 24th, the count is 53.

Source: Iraq Coalition Casualties

Janet

Janet was a beautiful, very intelligent, well read and creative woman. She was an Art major at BYU, earning a BA degree. After teaching high school art for a couple of years, she took on the role of housewife, marrying an Air Force pilot and raising a family of 5 children.

Janet suffered her entire adult life from depression, seeing psychiatrists and consuming a regimen of prescribed medications for years and years. Despite this, being born and raised in the Mormon church and remaining an active member as an adult, she served in a variety of church positions and devoted extensive time and effort to these duties. This, in addition to the demands of raising a large family.

I spoke of Janet in the past tense above. Janet is my mom. She's still with us, but a creeping dementia has been stealing her for the past 15 or so years. I think Mom was one of the most interesting people I've ever known. Eclectically knowledgable, she was great at Jeopardy. She was raised in Las Vegas and her father was also artistically inclined. I think this contributed to her being more liberally minded than most Mormons, and resulted in a bit less strict upbringing for my siblings and me than would have been the case if it were solely up to my dad.

In many respects, it's like my mom's already dead. You could definitely say she's not with us. She lays on the couch all day looking at books or magazines, perhaps reading without comprehending. She's there when you go to visit, and she'll usually smile and maybe say a word or two here or there, but she's not really there.

I miss my mom.