Individual Liberty — Individual Responsibility

For those we lost, We will not forget 09/11/2001

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
— The Continental Congress, July 4, 1776

“The task of statesmanship has always been the re-definition of these rights in terms of a changing and growing social order.”
— Franklin D. Roosevelt (Commonwealth Club Address, 1932)

“Roosevelt was wrong! The principles laid down in the Declaration of Independence are the principles of individual liberty. Our unalienable rights, given to us by God are given to us as individuals. Our rights do not come from society or the government, and they cannot be redefined by politicians. The nature of these rights carries with it the implication of individual responsibility, without which we surrender them.”
— Perri Nelson, November 6, 2008

I loath Windows Vista!

Published Wed, Nov 28 2007 9:22 AM
Technorati Tags: Computers and Internet, Annoyances

If there's one operating system that I can truly say that I loath, it's Windows Vista. I know that I'm not the only one. Some time back I bought a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate for my PC and the results of installing it and running it were a true disaster. In the end, I went through the rather painful process of downgrading back to Windows XP.

Well, there's even more bad news for Vista this morning. Apparently it's also s–l–o–w–e–r!

The third Service Pack for Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Windows XP, expected to be publicly released next year, might boost the operating system's speed to the point where it is substantially faster than Vista, its successor OS, according to a new study.
In a benchmarking comparison between a beta version of XP Service Pack 3 and Vista with Service Pack 1, Devil Mountain Software of Florida found that the SP3-tweaked XP left Vista in the dust.
The tests showed that XP, modified with the forthcoming service pack, had twice the performance of Vista modified with SP1, the new OS's first upgrade that is going to be released early next year.
Vista was more than twice as slow as XP with SP3 in the tests using DMS Clarity Studio OfficeBench test script "to drive Microsoft Office 2007 through a scripted set of productivity tasks, including creating a compound document and supporting workbooks and presentations materials," according to Devil Mountain Software.

Of course the article goes on later to say that "Few people will notice the performance difference".

I'm still not impressed. I know that relatively soon I'll be forced to use Vista. At some point Microsoft will drop support for XP, just like they drop support for a lot of older products. It makes sense for their bottom line to do so.

I'm putting it off as long as I can though, because there is at least one thing that's true about the latest round of "I'm a Mac — and I'm a PC" commercial ads from Apple. If your hardware isn't compatible with Vista, Microsoft's attitude is "buy new hardware".

What? Am I made of money?

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Wednesday Hero - Sgt. Antwan L. Walker

Published Wed, Nov 28 2007 8:40 AM

Sgt. Antwan L. Walker
22 years old from Tampa, Florida
2nd Forward Support Battalion, 2nd Infantry Division
May 18, 2005

Sgt. Antwan Walker was excited about coming home from Iraq to celebrate his 23rd birthday with his family and friends. His mother, Andrea Pringle, was busy planning the party when an Army official unexpectedly came to her house.

She said he told her Thursday that her son was killed the previous day by a bomb blast in Ramadi. The Department of Defense hasn't publicly confirmed his death.

Sgt. Antwan Walker, known as Twan to his friends and family, joined the Army in 2000. Pringle said her son joined to earn money for college.

"Twan had a lot of goals in life," She said. "He was very ambitious and very smart."

Sgt. Walker had been in Iraq for about a year. He called his family often but didn't want to talk about war. Instead, he talked about starting a real estate career and his three children.

"He was such a good dad," his mother said. "All he wanted to do was make a good life for his kids."

In April 2005, Walker wanted to talk about the fighting. He told his mother five soldiers he was traveling with were killed. His phone calls became more frequent after that.

Pringle said she had days when she couldn't eat or sleep because of her worries. But she never forgot to give her son her support.

"I always told him I'm proud and be safe".

These brave men and women sacrifice so much in their lives so that others may enjoy the freedoms we get to enjoy everyday. For that, I am proud to call them Hero. We Should Not Only Mourn These Men And Women Who Died, We Should Also Thank God That Such People Lived

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