Dark Pegasus

Ever since watching Small Fortunes: Microcredit and the Future of Poverty I’ve been interested in microfinance and various initiatives to help the poor. I followed the documentary with reading The End of Poverty and Banker to the Poor some time back, getting more into it. Paying attention to success stories for it is encouraging, though some areas are having growing pains trying to expand their operations and stay true to the original goals.

So a couple months ago a friend of mine told me about kiva.org and it’s an interesting site. It allows anyone to make microloans in increments of $25. That’s pretty reasonable so I signed up. If you know about micro finance already and want to help then I strongly encourage you to sign up at kiva and make a donation. If you don’t know about it read on as I try to sell you on it.

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Boredom + Image Editor + Cafe Press -> new Cafe Press Store.

I’m not exactly sure why it struck me to create a Cafe Press storefront. Something just called out to me that the world needed another two mug designs; one small, one large, both geeky.

Or maybe I just need sleep.

They’re making a Max Payne movie staring Mark Wahlberg to be released Oct 17.

Looking at the trailer it seems to be suitably over the top. Awesome.

Pure win. It is great to see a democrat willing to say something this blunt and funny. Obama said it in response to the jabs taken at him by various Republicans and pundits about his suggestion to keep car tires inflated properly. On top of that he explicitly called out their statements as lies. Way to take the FUD spewed out and throw it back at them. I hope he keeps this up and only wish Gore and Kerry had done the same.

Choice quote from the Huffington Post:

Speaking to a crowd in Berea, Ohio, Obama went off on a riff, laughing at Republicans who are isolating his call for tire inflation as the linchpin of his energy plan. After noting that his energy policy has a lot more to it, Obama circled back to wonder why Republicans were choosing to mock an idea, small though it was, that could actually help matters.

“Now two points,” Obama told the crowd. “One, they know they’re lying about what my energy plan is, but the other thing is they’re making fun of a step that every expert says would absolutely reduce our oil consumption by three to four percent. It’s like these guys take pride in being ignorant.”

Obama was responding to a question when he mentioned the tires. The man asked what can we as individuals do to reduce our dependency on oil. This wasn’t the central part of his plan as it has been portrayed.

For the record keeping proper inflation is an easy way, among others, to improve the mileage of your car. There is a government website which lists several ways to improve your mileage. Just that could increase your gas mileage by 4%. Changing your driving habits is more dramatic – up to another 50% difference. According to another government site the average car drives 12,000 miles per year and gets 25 mpg. Combining that with one estimate that there are 143 million cars on the road the current consumption is about 68.5 billion gallons of gas per year. I’m just spit-balling here but assuming the average car could get a 10% boost on it’s fuel economy by making some simple changes we’re looking at almost 7 billion gallons of gasoline saved per year. That’s an impressive amount.

Taking pride in being ignorant indeed.

Recently I’ve bumped into several projects which have sparked an interest in me for learning electronics. Something appeals to me about building a physical device to interact with in addition to the software required.

I hope to work my way up to building a build indicator, a small robot or an intruder defense system in the next few months. So where does someone like me get started? Why, with the basics of course. To that end I’ve picked up Electronic Circuits for the Evil Genius and have been building the circuits in there. The book has a nice project based approach which is good for getting your hands dirty quickly (how I learn best). I haven’t designed any circuits yet but that will come after I have a better feel for why the circuits do what they do.

After I have a handful of experiments under my belt I think I’m going to pick up a book with more theory and revisit the circuits I’ve already built. Wish me luck!

Taken on the way to work along 14th street.

The Washington Post is reporting today that one of Bush’s executive orders was enough to even get some republican congressmen upset at him:

Although the revamped order had been in the works for a year, its formal unveiling prompted a rare revolt from congressional Republicans, some of whom walked out on Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell during a morning briefing. Rep. Pete Hoekstra (Mich.), ranking Republican on the House intelligence committee, led several GOP colleagues to the exit after complaining that the administration had made the changes secretly without consulting with congressional overseers — part of a pattern dating to the beginning of the Bush presidency, Hoekstra said.

“Given the impact that this order will have on America’s intelligence community, and this committee’s responsibility to oversee intelligence activities, this cannot be seen as anything other than an attempt to undercut congressional oversight,” Hoekstra said in a statement afterward.

After seven years of providing little to no oversight on the president they get upset that he’s trying to undercut oversight? Wow. They really are trying to distance themselves from the President in time for elections.