This is the website of Abulsme Noibatno Itramne (also known as Sam Minter). Posts here are rare these days. For current stuff, follow me on Mastodon

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@abulsme tweets from 2013-09-01 (UTC)

@abulsme tweets from 2013-08-31 (UTC)

  • My fitbit #Fitstats for 8/30/2013: 1,989 steps and 1.5 km traveled. http://t.co/yvGq0OoOT9 01:02:01
  • Reading – The NSA’s ‘Black Budget’ and Why We Should Be Worried About What Snowden Nabbed (Bob Cesca) http://t.co/pXgcngx3k9 03:55:25
  • Reading – David Cameron asked permission to strike Syria. Why won’t Obama? (Brad Plumer) http://t.co/AWg4DdOAvl 03:59:07
  • Reading – U.S. spy agencies mounted 231 offensive cyber-operations in 2011, docs show (Gellman/Nakashima) http://t.co/e0W2v9bpfx 04:36:51
  • Reading – UK’s Cameron must fight back after tough setback (Gregory Katz) http://t.co/mVJufI1WUG 05:08:19
  • Reading – The Tomahawks Of August (Rod Dreher) http://t.co/UzOgRStSHI 05:13:16
  • Reading – UK government says Greenwald partner practiced terrible security (Timothy B. Lee) http://t.co/plcT5PmTYN 05:28:11
  • Reading – UK asked N.Y. Times to destroy Snowden material | Reuters (Mark Hosenball) http://t.co/7d7mO3hHw5 05:59:03
  • Reading – Why Nobody Cares About the Surveillance State (David Rieff) http://t.co/Qj3zxd6IGr 06:05:34
  • [Abulpost] No More Reposts to Google+ for Me http://t.co/GVNVM5kS14 06:16:17
  • Reading – Surveillance disclosure battle heats up (Romm/Quinn) http://t.co/Nz9alkMU5w 06:19:06
  • Reading – The case for Syria may be worse than Iraq (Alex Seitz-Wald) http://t.co/4LHyddOhGi 06:29:00
  • RT @AlecMacGillis: Dracula really had it coming. RT @reidepstein: Fun fact: The last country the US formally declared war against was Roman… 06:51:33
  • Reading – New Zealand appears to have used NSA spy network to target Kim Dotcom (Cyrus Farivar) http://t.co/PFglwSC86h 16:30:22
  • RT @davidfrum: Shots across the bow work because it is expected they'll be followed by shots into the hull. But if not … 16:31:50
  • Reading – Experts Fear U.S. Plan to Strike Syria Overlooks Risks (Barnard/Rubin) http://t.co/7fKkipJWvT 16:51:39
  • Reading – Tooth Fairy Inflation (Centives) http://t.co/lDh8yCfkm9 16:56:36
  • Reading – Larry a summers and the Secret 'End-Game' Memo (Greg Palant) http://t.co/CO23iCNFMU 17:03:35
  • RT @tparsi: You know something's up when Diplomats favor war, and Generals favor diplomacy

    #Syria #Dempsey #Kerry @MehdiRHasan @Ali_Gharib… 17:06:57

  • Doesn't say how much he started with! -> Reading – Make $377,000 trading Apple in one day (Rob Curran) http://t.co/boNBsDj06x 17:21:42
  • Speech Over. I obviously disagree with intervention, but big kudos to @BarackObama for taking it to the Congress. That is the right call. 18:01:03
  • Now we'll see what happens in Congress. Next test will be what Obama does if Congress says no. Presume Obama thinks he has the votes though. 18:02:47
  • RT @chucktodd: May be first time in years that just about every single member of Congress, regardless of party will issue a press release p… 18:04:06
  • RT @BenjySarlin: VERY bad RT @sahilkapur: Bad news for the members of Congress who wanted to wash their hands of this and criticize whateve… 18:08:17
  • RT @JHarperReports: Operation Symbolic Gesture in #Syria has been postponed. Operation Labor Day BBQ will proceed as scheduled. 18:14:20
  • This should be very interesting in the Congress by the way. Opinions on this not really divided on D/R lines. 18:20:07
  • RT @jricole: Interesting possibility that a Left-Libertarian alliance in Congress could defeat Syria resolution 18:22:11
  • RT @gerrycanavan: "strikes will be just as effective tomorrow as they will be in a month" What about a year? I bet they'd be JUST AS EFFECT… 18:52:03
  • RT @AdamSerwer: Rep. Peter King says Obama's decision to go to Congress "undermining the authority of future presidents." Means it as a bad… 19:01:07
  • Reducing power of president vs power of congress is a GOOD thing as far as I am concerned. :-) 19:01:42
  • RT @arishapiro: Overheard: "Congress now knows what it feels like when the dog catches the car." 19:22:14
  • Reading – Obama made last-minute decision on Syria approval (Josh Lederman) http://t.co/dzIi87zxRQ 19:53:46
  • "The administration officials described a president overriding all his top national security advisers…" – and making the right call. 19:54:59
  • (Of course, he should have done the same in Libya.) 19:55:55
  • RT @RichardEngel: #syrian opposition very disappointed. They were building hope that strikes would be tonight, feel carpet pulled out from … 19:56:57
  • Bet Kerry is pissed. At least publicly he seemed way more hung ho about this than Obama. May not be the same privately of course. 19:58:59
  • RT @attackerman: Future presidents who want to launch "discrete" military strikes ala Iraq 98 &c will now face Q of why they don't go to Co… 19:59:12
  • Wonder how many of the top advisors Obama overrode will still be there by the end of the administration. 20:00:52
  • Or even in a year. 20:01:04
  • RT @marcambinder: Wow. Obama just pulled the loose string from that Gordian knot of the imperial presidency. 20:01:12
  • I hope so! (But doubt it.) -> @marcambinder: Wow. Obama just pulled the loose string from that Gordian knot of the imperial presidency. 20:02:29
  • Yeah, not a happy team. MT @passantino: RT @petesouza: Pres meeting with NatSec team this morning: http://t.co/Ieb4ik6QLB 20:12:06
  • RT @bobcesca_go: View from 50,000 feet. Americans debating the use of military force. A president reasonable enough to pay attention. 20:14:54
  • Reading – Obama DOJ Asks Court to Grant Immunity to George W. Bush For Iraq War (Inder Comar) http://t.co/ZrORjIH3RD 21:32:46
  • Amy just registered to vote! Wow! (Turning 18 in October.) Time sure flies… 22:35:01

No More Reposts to Google+ for Me

The handful of you who follow me on Google+ may have noticed that for a little over a month, I haven’t been reposting my stuff over there. This is because the method I used to use to do so stopped working, and it was already extra clicks for me, so I didn’t really spend time looking for other, probably more time consuming, ways to do the sharing. I hoped it would start working again, but it has been long enough, it is time to say that I am no longer routinely sharing things I post on abulsme.com to Google+.

Sorry Google+ people.

If you want to continue keeping track of what I post, you can of course follow me directly on abulsme.com, via abulsme.com’s RSS on the RSS reader of your choice (I use Feedly), via Twitter, or via Facebook for all posts other than the daily Tweet summaries.

(I will manually share this one post to Google+ just to wrap things up. Bye Google+!)

@abulsme tweets from 2013-08-30 (UTC)

  • RT @iyad_elbaghdadi: Types of non-intervention:
    (1) There's no need
    (2) There's a need but we'll make things worse
    (3) There's a need but l… 00:24:19
  • RT @mattyglesias: This British thing where the parliament needs to vote before you bomb a country is fascinating. We should try it. 00:25:09
  • My fitbit #Fitstats for 8/29/2013: 5,225 steps and 3.9 km traveled. http://t.co/yvGq0OoOT9 01:02:01
  • Reading – Two Minds on Syria (George Packer) http://t.co/eh8L36Cv3i 01:24:40
  • Reading – The Threat Of Debt Ceiling Crises Is Over (Josh Barro) http://t.co/XMQWYERAvg 01:42:38
  • RT @mattfrost: Without copyright restrictions on the "I Have a Dream" speech, there'd be no incentive for other orators to lead huge, inspi… 03:27:42
  • Reading – Pot and the complexity of giving the president a hard time (Jonathan Bernstein) http://t.co/soBS87cm81 16:28:24
  • Listening to Kerry. Still not hearing anything that convinces me. Not hearing anything at all that convinces strikes will help anything. 17:17:12
  • Also continue to be bothered with idea that killing people with chem weapons worse than killing people with other weapons. Dead is dead. 17:19:13
  • & the idea that we should do something to preserve credibility… Yes creed matters. Fix that by not making stupid commitments in first place. 17:21:45
  • "We bomb because we care." – Obama (sorta) 18:48:58
  • RT @hhassan140: Obama is basically saying the US action will be a slap on the wrist. Translation: a big boost to Assad when he survives it. 18:59:42
  • Reading – NSA Spying Abroad isn't OK Either (Charles Kurzman) http://t.co/a0PlBjw6F3 20:43:40
  • Reading – Secret NSA Documents Show How the US Spies on Europe and the UN (Laura Poitras) http://t.co/95lhWbghV6 23:00:44
  • Reading – U.S. allows states to legalize recreational marijuana within limits (David Ingram) http://t.co/80b6u8p0yM 23:09:27
  • Reading – Ginsburg to officiate same-sex wedding (Robert Barnes) http://t.co/7RQT19lYvl 23:13:26
  • RT @BYUfan: @abulsme Alex sounds so cute. Looking forward to him guest hosting…the train episode. 23:32:58
  • .@BYUfan Thanks! I'm sure he will be ready to co-host any week now! :-) in reply to BYUfan 23:33:19

@abulsme tweets from 2013-08-29 (UTC)

Curmudgeon’s Corner: But Talk Quietly!

In the latest Curmudgeon’s Corner Sam and Ivan talk about:

  • AT&T Reliability
  • Ballmer / Microsoft
  • NSA
  • Syria

Recorded on 27 Aug 2013

Length this week – 1:16:41

1-Click Subscribe in iTunes Download MP3 File
View Podcast in iTunes View Raw XML Feed

@abulsme tweets from 2013-08-28 (UTC)

Some 2010/2011 Alex Movies

carsposterincrediblesposter

httydposterftbposter

Yeah yeah, I’m still posting things I’ve had on my list to post since February of 2011.

In this case, I normally don’t post notes about Alex movies, because I typically never just sat down and watched them from one end to the other straight through. Instead, I would catch bits and pieces here and there while he was watching and I was paying attention to other things. But he was between 1 and 2, and watching his favorite movies A LOT. :-)

But in late 2010 into early 2011, these four movies were so pervasive, and were being watched so much and so often, that I know I saw every minute, and became very familiar with them, to the point of being able to recite lines. Now, Alex knew them even better than I did, but still.

Of these four, Cars was by far Alex’s favorite. It was the go to movie. He got the toys. Before he got into trains, he had his “NiNi McQueen” and his “Mater”. And I liked it too. Alex later got into the largely forgettable Cars 2 sequel too, but for me Cars was the real thing as it were. A nice little sentimental story. Yeah, it had a couple races, but the soul of the story was McQueen coming to appreciate the benefits of the slower lifestyle of Radiator Springs and the bygone days of Route 66. The sequel completely lost that thread. Shame.

Alex’s least favorite of these four was probably the Incredibles. He just never really got into it too much, although it still got a lot of play in that time period. I thought it was OK and a bit amusing, but while I would sit down and happily watch Cars again, I don’t really feel a strong desire to watch the Incredibles again.

In between are the Dragon movie and the Big Bird movie. I’m thinking Alex probably liked them about equally. For me Dragon was much preferable. It was a fun little story. I liked it. Would not mind watching it again. By contrast, Follow that Bird was the type that was squarely aimed at young kids rather than being a “family” movie, so as an adult watching it, it gets tedious fast, although there are a few nice moments.

Anyway, that was the first batch of four movies I noted. There were more later of course. But I’ll only be noting the ones here where *I* ended up feeling like I had really and truly “watched” the whole movie, even if I didn’t necessarily see it in the correct order all at once. :-)

Late addition: As I was finishing up this post, Alex came up to my office to tell me it was time for dinner, and I showed him this post and asked him about the four movies. He said he remembered three of them… but didn’t remember The Incredibles at all. Which matches my memory that he was not too impressed by it. He liked the other three. :-)

@abulsme tweets from 2013-08-27 (UTC)

All Hands 19

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