MexiJew.com

This blog has moved!

2009-06-01T23:27:00.002-04:00

After almost a full decade at Mexijew.com, I have decided to move to a more professional site that more properly reflects my goals. That said, this site will redirect to ScottASavage.com in 15 seconds. Please update your bookmarks accordingly!

All Good Things...

2009-05-26T16:40:00.002-04:00

For almost a decade I have been posting all kinds of things on Mexijew.com. My thoughts, my aspirations, my frustrations, my life, my work, my hopes and my dreams. It's been a controversial site at times. I've received my fair share of anti-semitic e-mails and anonymous slams because of things I've said. I've even had the attention of Howard Stern and Fox News for some of the things I've posted. Today, however, it's time to move to a new home.

As of May 26, 2009, I will no longer be posting on Mexijew.com. I am moving my base of operations to ScottASavage.com. My format will be a little more professional, my posts a bit less... raw. My reasons for doing so are complex. When I started Mexijew.com I was barely over the age of 18, full of angst and lacking of skill, experience, wisdom, and tact. Well, I'm still full of angst and lacking of wisdom and tact, but I've got experience and a bit more common sense now. Besides all of that, I would like to be able to put my blog into my portfolio, and of course move to Wordpress after all these years using Blogger.com.

In the next few weeks I'll finish migrating posts over to ScottASavage.com and will change Mexijew.com into a redirector. Until then, please head on over to the new site for the latest and greatest. Expect more frequent posts and more interaction.

Thanks to everyone who ever visited Mexijew.com, left a comment, or sent an e-mail. It's been a wild ride. Let's keep the momentum going for the new site.

Home is where the FIOS is

2009-05-06T10:05:00.002-04:00

Well, I'm all moved into my new house. Things are okay so far. The house itself is a bit of a fixer upper, which isn't really what I was looking for but because of the outstanding deal it was hard to pass up. Still not fully unpacked, obviously, and I probably won't ever unpack a box or two for a few years. Heh.

The move itself went pretty well. The moving truck came a little late but they were extremely fast - only 3.5 hours. Less than $500, too, which is great - I expected it to be over $500. The only thing that really went wrong that day is my new kitchen appliances weren't delivered. Turns out the truck broke down. Thankfully, I got those, plus FIOS, a security system, and a new toilet on Monday, so all is well now.

Wanted to shill a bit for my friend Brian and his company Motorize. I did some freelance UI design work for them a few months ago and I'm very proud to say that they have launched their website, www.motorize.com. Motorize.com basically enables you to go through the entire car buying process online. No shifty salesmen to deal with, no bullshit back and forth with the manager. Just surf over to Motorize.com, check out their selection of cars and trucks, select the financing you want, get approved, and buy it online. Hell, apparently they can even deliver the car to your house after you've bought it online. Friggin' fantastic!

Finally, work is coming alone quite well on my other project - my new (replacement) website. The URL will be posted as soon as I'm done prettying it up. Keep your eyes here for more information.

Technorati Tags: Motorize, Car Buying.

A home all my own

2009-03-27T17:43:00.003-04:00

Nope, I'm not dead. Just been busy buying my very first house. Which, by the way, is fucking hard. I was totally unprepared for the sheer amount of paperwork, research, and soul seeking involved in buying a house.

On the other hand... it's going to be extremely rewarding to finally have a place of my own (and subsequently not have to remove dishes from the sink or clothes from the drier. Mmm...).

By the way, I'm going to be starting work on a new, more professional blog and domain soon. Mexijew.com will become a mirrored URL. I'll announce the new domain name shortly. Keep your eyes here.

Quick Review: Google Sync for the iPhone

2009-02-10T10:47:00.001-05:00

A few days ago Google finally debuted what I'd been hearing rumors about for a while and had been hoping was true: Google Sync for the iPhone. It enables you to sync your Google calendars (up to five), Google Contacts, and Gmail on your phone via Push technology (an MS Exchange server, basically). While you may be scratching your heads and wondering what's so great about that, let me tell you about how my iPhone & Google Calendar worked before.

Ever since Google launched their calendar application, I have had three calendars on my Google account that I actively maintain: A personal calendar, a work calendar with all of my meetings and milestone/due dates, and a bill calendar to keep track of all of my monthly bills and regular expenses. I also subscribe to Brian's Beer Calendar - his personal brewing schedule so I know when he's making that awesome hefeweizen (hefemärzen) of his.

To sync up all of these calendars, I setup iCal on my Mac to subscribe to all of those calendars (via a private RSS feed) and it would update my iPhone every time I synced. Trouble is that when you do it that way, data only flows one way. I could never make calendar entries on my iPhone because they don't sync backwards to my Google calendars. So, if I had an event that I wanted to put on my Personal calendar or a new meeting that I want to remember, I'd have to use Safari and update my calendar that way when I was on the go, or wait till I got back to my desk and do it on http://google.com/calendar.

With the new Google Sync for the iPhone, I can now have all three of my calendars (plus Brian's Beer Calendar) on my iPhone and add/remove/update events on the fly. It's a great service and it works extremely smoothly.

One tip for anyone who is planning to use it: after you follow the setup process at http://google.com/mobile/apple/sync.html, surf over to http://m.google.com/sync on your iPhone and login to add which calendars you want to sync. By default, only your primary calendar (in my case, just my personal calendar) syncs. You have to tell it which other calendars you also want to sync. Save your settings and check your calendar on your iPhone. It's great. Good job, Google.

P.S. I'm finally moving to Wordpress this weekend or next weekend. I apologize ahead of time for any downtime you may experience.

Technorati Tags: Google Sync, iPhone.

Something I need to get off my chest

2009-01-13T02:25:00.003-05:00

As I sit here at 2:30am, looking up ways to quench my diabetic thirst, it occurs to me that I'm really not taking care of myself the way I should be. Despite the fact that I've lost over 30 lbs recently, the fact is that I'm still eating and drinking too many sugary foods. I know this because I can feel it. If you're a type 2 diabetic like I am, you understand what I mean.

On workdays I imbibe a Venti Peppermint Mocha Twist. Almost religiously at lunch. I get regular coke instead of diet coke or water. I'm not exercising. I'm not eating right. And I'm just not doing what I need to do to live a longer, happier life. And yet... part of me just doesn't feel like changing. Change requires effort and work, and given that it's a trial just to get up in the morning, you can see why I feel as I do.

Motivation has always been a problem of mine, as far back as I can remember. Well before I was diagnosed diabetic back in 2001. Back when I was in school. That far back. I've never been able to figure out why I always feel so unmotivated. I wish I knew. Just finishing the simplest of tasks like bringing a letter to the mailbox is sometimes amazing to me. It's not just physical motivation. It's mental motivation. I wish I could understand.

Maybe I need to find a specialist to talk to. To help me find the motivation for change. I don't know. I don't know where to look to be honest. It seems like this motivation issue transcends the diabetes. I'm sure it does. This isn't a cry for help. This is just my confession. I needed to get it off my chest. I don't know if I can get my life in line and find some way to reconcile (mentally) all of the changes I need to make. I just needed to say this "out loud".

Technorati Tags: Diabetes, Motivation.

The New Star Trek

2008-12-10T19:09:00.001-05:00

In May of 2009, the 11th movie in the Star Trek franchise, simply called "Star Trek", will make its debut. It's being directed by J.J. Abrams of "Lost" and "Cloverfield" fame, and unlike previous Trek movies this is going to be a prequel to, well, just about everything (except Enterprise with Scott Bakula). It's going to be a "re-imagining" of the original series which in and of itself is quite controversial among hardcore Trekkies like myself. The Enterprise itself, along with places, characters, relationships, and back stories are all going to be tweaked.

The plot of Star Trek, while not fully publicized yet, is to tell the story of how James Kirk (played by Chris Pine) came to join Starfleet, meet Spock (played by Zachary Quinto), and become the youngest, most infamous captain in Starfleet history. All of this under the guise of a time travel story in which the original Spock (Leonard Nimoy) sets things in motion by going back in time and meeting with the young Cadet James T. Kirk at Starfleet Academy on Earth.

As I said above, there is quite a bit of controversy surrounding the plot and the re-imagining of a number of things about the Star Trek universe. For example, one of the major sticking points is that the primary enemy in the movie will be a Romulan named Nero (played by Eric Bana). While the Romulan race was well-known when Kirk was in the academy (see the Earth-Romulan War for more on that), factually speaking no one had ever seen what a Romulan looked like until the Original Series episode, "Balance of Terror", in which we all discover that Romulans look just like (and in fact are directly related to) Vulcans. That's a big change to what is considered to be "Trek Canon".

Another controversial change to the canon of Trek is the location of the USS Enterprise's construction, based on the theatrical trailer. It appears that, despite the fact that the original Enterprise's dedication plaque says it was built in San Francisco on Earth, the trailer seems to point out that the Enterprise was constructed in the middle of rural Iowa, where Kirk grew up. This could be untrue, however, as it's not entirely clear from the trailer although it looks very much like it's in Iowa.

Among other things, the design of the Enterprise (pictured above) is noticeably different. Personally, I love the new design. It makes a lot of sense given what technologies we have now versus what was believed to have been possible back in the 60's. A lot of the design elements make sense from a continuity perspective as well. For example, the change to the warp nacelle struts - much thicker and angular than the original - gives a more realistic sense to the kind of load that they could bear versus the old struts that seemed to be extremely thin and undersized.

The look of the new bridge (pictured above & below) is a huge diversion from the original design - or of any Star Trek bridge design for that matter. First and foremost, the forward viewscreen on the bridge isn't a solid piece of metal but indeed a large, wide window that has a projection/holographic overview displayed on it. It's quite amazing and really gives you a sense of openness. The new bridge is also a very sterile white, unlike the original bridge which was grey and surrounded by very harsh red and black elements. It gives it a more open feel and in some ways makes me think of how the interior of the Space Shuttle looks - very clean, very white, very efficient.

So, will it stand up to the expectations of hardcore Trekkies like myself? Will it be a box office flop? Will it actually attract a diverse, non-Trekkie audience like J.J. Abrams is aiming for? I hope so. I'd really like to see the Trek franchise start up again. Living without new Trek for these last few years has really sucked and I for one look forward to new stories that boldly go where no one has gone before.

Technorati Tags: Star Trek, J.J. Abrams.

"Change has come to America"

2008-11-05T00:16:00.003-05:00

Barack Obama, the 44th President of the United States of America. The first African-American President of the United States of America. Now the hard part begins: fixing what went so very wrong in the last eight years under the leadership of President George W. Bush.

Sorry Phelps. Probably not a good night for you. McCain's concession speech was excellent and very dignified. Your party fought a great, historic race, and it makes the victory for President Elect Obama that much more worthwhile to have gone against such a competent and senior statesman.

Here's looking forward to what will hopefully be four to eight years of a better, more respectable USA.

Technorati Tags: Obama, McCain.

Wassup 2008

2008-10-28T15:47:00.003-04:00

As Brian put it, "Interesting. A twist that makes it momentarily tolerable."

Vote Obama on November 4.

Technorati Tags: Obama, Wassup.

Knight Rider

2008-09-24T20:42:00.001-04:00

Knight Rider was awesome. NBC, please don't treat it like Fox did Firefly.

Technorati Tags: Knight Rider.

John McCain "suspends" campaign

2008-09-24T16:16:00.000-04:00

Saw this picture on the Washington Post homepage after hearing that John McCain was "suspending" his campaign (ahem, dodging the first Presidential Debate on Friday which was probably going to have a lot of questions that he couldn't answer well about the economy) to return to the Senate and "get to work" on this lovely bailout package.

Anyway, here's the picture - slightly modified to read his mind:

I'm sure this has nothing to do with McCain's nine point slide in the last few days, what with him changing his stance on the economy three times in the last week.

Technorati Tags: McCain, Flip Flop.

Risky Business

2008-09-18T16:08:00.000-04:00

Over the last week we have watched as the US stock market has gone on a very scary roller coaster ride. In the last few months, we've watched as some of the largest financial corporations in the world have failed, gone into bankruptcy, and in some cases have been "saved" by the US government with our very own tax dollars. Just this morning, Treasury Secretary Paulson announced a major "bailout" plan for these huge companies in crisis. He said, and I quote:

"We're talking hundreds of billions of dollars - this needs to be big enough to make a real difference and get at the heart of the problem," he said. "This is the way we stabilize the system."

Where's this money coming from? US tax dollars. Your money and my money. Right now they're just digging a deeper hole into the national debt, but in the end it's our hard-earned money that's paying for this. I understand that it's a necessarily evil right now - if some of these companies were allowed to fail - and I do think that many of them should be allowed to fail in most cases - after all, they are risk-based businesses and where's the risk if you know the government is going to bail you out when you fuck up? - it would cause a global economic crisis even bigger than the one we're seeing now.

But one thing that's not being discussed and I think really should be is the CEO's and executive officers of these large corporations who really are at the foundation of why these things are happening. While we've seen that the regulators for Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac have denied their CEO's their so-called "golden parachute" severance packages, the fact remains that these people are still ungodly rich and are going to move on to be on the board of directors and executive arm of other large companies. It's just how the business works.

I think these men and women at the very top of these institutions should not only be denied their severance packages, but they should also be held accountable in other ways. If you're on the board of Countrywide or Lehman Brothers, you shouldn't be allowed to take another job on the board of another large company for, say, ten years. It's not like these people are poor, either. They're rich, white men and women, and what they don't get out of their golden parachutes they easily have in some kind of investments - and probably have been smart enough to invest in things that most of us can't afford or don't understand - things that aren't doing poorly in this crisis like precious metals and oil.

So I ask you, my friends and readers, to write your Senators and Representatives and ask them to make sure that these sleazebag executives get held accountable and pay a price for what they've done. This isn't a democrat issue or a republican issue - it's an everyone issue.

Technorati Tags: SEC, Stock Market, Taxes, Accountability, Golden Parachute, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bailout, Financial Crisis.

No

2008-09-02T12:54:00.001-04:00

Websense: Bane of my existence

2008-08-27T16:45:00.002-04:00

As you may have noticed, I've been somewhat... quiet lately here on my blog. Maybe you thought I slipped into a lull like I occasionally do. Maybe you thought I was dead. Maybe you didn't notice - shame on you! Never the less, I'm still alive, still kicking. Just a bit miffed, that's all. After threatening to do it for years, the agency I contract on-site at finally decided to install and activate Websense - internet filtering software - here at the office. So now... well, let's just say that my days became a bit more frustrating.

As of a few days ago, however, I'm using an online service called Log Me In to access one of my computers back at home and use THAT computer to surf where I need/want to without being blocked by the filter. I must say that I'm pretty impressed with the service and that it even lets me remote connect to my MacBook - which Go To My PC doesn't let you do.

Anyway, that's why I've been quiet. More good stuff to come, including a possible redesign. I've been playing again with Ajax and have am looking to implement some fun tweaks to the blog including some interfacing with the Twitter API.

Oh - one more thing: To those of you who are hand-coders and are hardcore Homesite fans, if you're looking for a more up-to-date version of Homesite, look no further than TopStyle 3.5 - it's got all of the best features of TopStyle for CSS along with a new HTML coding mode that looks and works almost exactly like Homesite 5.5+ because it's made by the same guy who designed Homesite originally. Enjoy!

Technorati Tags: Internet Filtering, websense, LogMeIn, Ajax, Twitter, Homesite, TopStyle.

Silverback - for Usability!

2008-08-07T17:07:00.001-04:00

I heard about Silverback on Monday from Jen at Thinkgeek, and after testing it out by myself at home, I decided to bring my Macbook into the office today and show off how easy (and cheap) usability testing can be with Silverback - a wonderful new application from Clearleft.

Without going too deep into the details, after I made one single live recording of myself using the SAMHSA.gov website to find a specific grant and explained what this simple usability test could mean, the clients were so impressed that I was asked to make a "wish list" for this upcoming fiscal year in which we'd purchase a few MacBook's or iMac's, along with licenses for Silverback, and we'd finally get to open our own USABILITY LAB! Nice!

I've been pushing for having Mac's here at the office for a few years now, and thanks to Silverback and the sheer simplicity of it, it looks like that may finally be coming to fruition!

Anybody looking to get quality usability testing done on the cheap, Silverback is the way to go!

Technorati Tags: Usability, Silverback.

It's back!

2008-07-29T15:08:00.002-04:00

A List Apart has put up it's second "The Survey For People Who Make Websites". Last year was their first survey and the results were extremely interesting to anyone in the IT field - specifically to website developers and designers.

I just took the survey for this year, now it's your turn. Click on the image below to get started. No personally identifiable data will be collected.

Technorati Tags: A List Apart, The Survey For People Who Make Websites.

Your vs. You're

2008-07-28T10:43:00.002-04:00

An important lesson for everyone to try and remember:

Props to The Warehouse for the use of their awesome comic.

Technorati Tags: The Warehouse, Grammar.

First Impressions: iPhone 2.0 Firmware & App's Store

2008-07-11T12:14:00.001-04:00

Ever since Apple formally announced the iPhone 3G I've been contemplating whether or not to replace my purchased-in-May-God-damnit 1st generation iPhone or simply wait it out for a model with 32gb or more of storage. Since the 2.0 firmware was going to be released - for free - for first gen iPhone owners, I decided to keep the first gen and "live without" GPS and 3G voice and data.

Thursday, around lunchtime, I went home and put the (leaked, thanks Gizmodo!) 2.0 firmware on my first gen iPhone and, after what seemed like a scary 35 minute firmware update (thought it had locked up on me!), started downloading Apps from the all-new App Store. The first thing I noticed with the 2.0 firmware is that Apple finally added a link on the home screen to the Contacts application, so that you didn't have to access the phone app every time you wanted to look up a contacts name or address. Very convenient!

The second and third things I noticed happened when I was adding a new e-mail account. First, the new push-based e-mail system is wonderfully fast and in my opinion will give RIM a run for its money (rumor is that Apple is working on an Enterprise version of the iPhone for businesses, so, nyah RIM!). The other great thing I discovered about the 2.0 firmware is that you can now see the characters you're typing in for passwords, instead of just seeing black dots. Used to be frustrating as hell to try and get a complex alpha-numeric-special character password in properly without being able to see whether or not the key you hit was right. Well done on that one, Apple.

Now, on to the App Store and the applications within! This is why I didn't jailbreak my iPhone. The App Store is well done, and the fact that over 500 quality applications were already available yesterday is spectacular. I downloaded a ton of free applications yesterday including: AIM (works great!), Remote (great iTunes remote control!), Google (eh), Mobile Flickr (yay!), Facebook, Myspace, WeatherBug (needs some work), Shazam (I've missed this one so much since I abandoned my Nokia N95), VoiceNotes, BoxOffice, and Twitterific. I also bought BattleAtSea (neat battleship game), and Band - which is a truly unique and innovative application for anyone who loves making music. I'm sure my bass teacher is going to love it when he sees it this weekend.

Overally, I don't really feel like I'm missing anything by upgrading my old iPhone to the new firmware. 3G data costs $10 more a month and doesn't really make a big difference to me, and since I've already got a GPS navigator for my car, I don't really feel like I'm missing out on that either - especially since the A-GPS built into the first gen iPhone works so well anyway.

Kudos to Apple on a wonderful upgrade to what I believe is the best gadget on the market today.

Technorati Tags: Gizmodo, Apple, iPhone, App Store, Jesus Phone, RIM.

Banana Hammock

2008-06-02T15:23:00.003-04:00

While staying with my father in New Jersey over the Memorial Day weekend, I discovered this lovely item in his kitchen:

Yes. A miniature hammock with a bunch of bananas in it. A banana hammock. My father didn't get it. The humor was entirely lost on him.

Technorati Tags: Banana Hammock.

The Big Word Project

2008-05-14T16:10:00.002-04:00

The Big Word Project is a fun little project setup by two guys from Northern Ireland whose main goal is to study how different words mean different things to different people. Well, that's their stated goal, anyway. I'm sure that one of their unstated goals is to make money.

To participate in the project, you go to their website, TheBigWordProject.com, and search for words. You can then "purchase" a word at the price of $1.00 per letter. By purchasing a word, you can have it link to any website of your choosing, thus redefining the word. For instance, Greg Storey at Airbag Industries purchased "singular" - a great word for him in my opinion - which now links to his site.

After a good 30 second of thought, I purchased "schadenfreude" - my very favorite word in the entire world - which means "to take enjoyment from the misfortune of others." Basically, being an asshole. I like that. It pleases me. You can find a link to my word on the sidebar of this site, just below the search box.

Was it a waste of $13? No way. I really dig neat little projects like theirs. It's a nice departure from normal word play, and let's face it - free marketing for my terrible, horrible, no-good blog. One thing is certain, though: You can expect to read more schadenfreude stories on here now!

Technorati Tags: schadenfreude, The Big Word Project.

CMS for the Accessible Federal Agency

2008-04-25T12:01:00.002-04:00

Every now and then I'm tasked with an especially interesting assignment at the office. A real "humdinger" of a task that breaks the cycle of normalcy and helps to pad the old resume. By default my job tends to revolve around a few tasks that are repeated throughout the weeks and months: website design, maintenance, Section 508 issue resolution, UI support, and helping to write standard operating procedures/white papers. So when new, important tasks come up, I always jump at the chance to help break the monotony. Today was one of those big days.

Today I was tasked with taking the lead on picking a Content Management System (CMS) for the federal agency that I currently work for on-site. It's a very big, very important responsibility that will have a deep impact on everything that I and the web team here do from now until the end of our contract in four years. This will steer the direction that we go and lock us into a very expensive piece of software. Obviously not a task to take lightly.

So, what is it we're looking for in our CMS? Well, the "need-to-haves" are:

Works on the .NET / IIS platform with SQL/Oracle database support
Generates valid XHTML
Uses templates that are/can be easily made to be Section 508
Costs under $30k
Can be implemented on both an Intranet and Internet site
Highly scalable
Licensed and supported commercially
Includes a user friendly WYSIWYG editor for non-technical content managers

Those are the basic elements of the CMS solution that we're looking for. At first glance those seem like a lot of requirements, but really those are just skimming the surface. Cost will probably be an issue and if we decide to go with one of the more expensive packages there will no doubt be discussions back and forth about whether or not it's worth it.

So far in my research, I've come across three CMS packages that fit the basic bill. The first (and best fit thus far) is Percussion Software's Rhthymix, which ironically is being used by HHS. It's got a lot of bang for the buck, and seems to be fairly easy to implement. The price is also listed as "negotiable", which means it's either ridiculously expensive or might actually be within our budget.

The other two packages I've found thus far are called Immediacy CMS and RedDot CMS, which seems to be the more solid of the two at first glance, but starts at $55k - way out of our price range. Never the less, it's going to stay on the list for the initial presentation.

Next Steps

As today was the first day of this project, obviously nothing major will come of what progress has been made thus far. The process of picking out our CMS is going to be long and thorough since it represents a major paradigm shift in the way we currently get our content out onto the web.

After picking out three or four solid CMS packages I'll call the vendors to ask the tough questions (price, support, availability, scale, upgrades, true Section 508 compliance, etc.) as well as try and setup a good date for them to come out and give us a nice demo. That's followed up by discussion, demo testing, more discussion, and then the real work begins: setup, implementation, and moving content from flat ASPX pages to clean, database-driven content.

There's a lot of work ahead of me, and I don't see this really getting to the decision point until May or June, but that will give us a lot of time to get our pages cleaned up and ready for the transition and for me to continue growing my hair out I'll have something to tear out while the transition is going on.

Technorati Tags: cms, content management system, immediacy, reddot, rhythmix.

Site transition: Successful!

2008-04-23T18:58:00.003-04:00

I am pleased to inform you that the move from my former web host to my new host, as well as the transition from ASP-driven pages to PHP-driven pages was successful and there was zero downtime. The DNS update was propogated within four hours of the initial update, and thanks to some handy tricks with my .htaccess file, search engine placement and bookmarks should be preserved perfectly.

The only thing that isn't currently working is the contact form, which I'll need to work on a bit. It's been using ASP Formmail for a few years now, so I've got to consider whether or not to use Dreamhost's free cgi Formmail or write my own script. Depends on my laziness level, I suppose.

Either way, if you discover a bug or find a broken link, please let me know via the comments for this post. Thanks!

The transition begins!

2008-04-23T12:02:00.003-04:00

Mexijew.com will be going down at some point over the next few days while I move it to a new host and switch it over to php. Initially, all of the pages will still be .asp, but I've got the .htaccess file configured to read the .asp extension as a php file, thus preserving search engine placement and keeping URL's fresh and real.

See you on the flip side!

Is it time for Hillary to pack it up?

2008-04-16T15:44:00.001-04:00

As many of my old readers know, and most of the new ones have probably figured out, I am a liberal. A moderate liberal, anyway. I'm not one of those "foam at the mouth" types who go monkey shit crazy for raising taxes and social programs, but I'm definitely more to the left than I am to the right. I, like many Americans, have been displeased with the way the US policy has been shaped in the last seven years and I'm looking forward to a change of any kind, because let's be honest here: None of the 3 major candidates are as corrosively partisan as the Bush Administration has been. No matter who wins, it's highly likely that we'll see some positive changes in some of the issues that matter the most (money, war, foreign policy).

Still, there's something that's bothering me. When it was time to vote in the Maryland Primaries, I didn't vote because I honestly couldn't decide which democrat I liked more - Hillary or Obama. Honestly, both of them share stances on the issues I'm most concerned about that it's hard to tell which would be better for me. Both also represent what I feel to be a major positive achievement in the history of our country: Both would be a tremendous first for the US - first true female contender for president, or first African-American contender for president. The way I see it, it's a win/win scenario both ways.

As time has gone on and things have been released about both candidates, I have admittedly leaned a little more towards Hillary Clinton. Not because of anything she did, however. I've leaned a little more towards Hillary because of the anti-semitic comments made by Barack Obama's pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright. While Obama did come out and say that he didn't agree with some of the less-than-friendly stuff that Rev. Wright said, he didn't do what most politicians do in situations like this: distance themselves from the offender. While I can appreciate the candor with which Obama spoke about this incident, my inner Jew is always afraid and suspicious of people who associate themselves with those who blindly dislike my people or blame them for things that we aren't at fault for.

Despite all of that, however, I think it might be time for Hillary Clinton to pack it up and leave the race. Lately she and Obama have been going at it in a very negative way, and I'd hate to see this kind of negativity go far enough that it would damage the chance of the democratic presidential candidate in November. I don't think that would happen since the US has a very short memory of things that are said and done, but I don't think intra-party turmoil does us any good either, except to give the media something to discuss constantly.

Is it time for Hillary to pack it up, or should she continue to campaign and let the cards fall as they will at the Democratic National Convention in August?

Technorati Tags: Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Elections, Democrats.

It's time for a change

2008-04-09T12:25:00.000-04:00

For over five years now, I've blogged on Mexijew.com and it's been a bittersweet experience. I enjoy blogging, and really enjoy all of the great feedback and e-mails I get from people. I haven't enjoyed the racist e-mails and comments, or the fact that I'm simply not comfortable giving some of my coworkers the link to this blog because, well, mexijew sounds more like a racial slur than something that an IT professional writes on.

With that in mind, I believe it's time for a change. I'm going to keep this blog going, and I'm going to keep the domain name mexijew.com, but I'm going to use a new domain name with it as well. I already own a number of domain names that I'm not really using, so I thought I'd give you, my loyal readers, the chance to have some input on what the new domain name should be.

I currently have two domain names that I'm not really using for anything and could switch to:

PartialZero.com - Test blog using WordPress
Flavored-Air.com - Mostly used for file storage

This might also be a good time to move this site from old school ASP 3.0 to php, although there's some obvious logistical issues that would have to be worked out (as well as search engine placement issues), but I think that's something that needs to happen anyway. There's no good reason to use ASP 3.0 anymore.

Do you have any suggestions? Do you think either of those domain names would be great to use? Let me know - post in the comments below.

Technorati Tags: mexijew.com, domain names.